Soul Trance
by snowbunnie13
Summary: Third in the Soul Equilibrium series. "So, then, what's Soul Eater, if that's not your real name?" Maka asked. "That's my stage name, duh." He smiled fondly. "My Grandma gave it to me."
1. Chapter 1

Soul Trance!

Chapter one: You're not sexy! Why is Soul dressed like Black*Star?

It was a few days since they'd both confessed to each other. Afterward, it was almost as if the confession had never happened. But it did! Maka remembered it! How could she forget? _Soul said that he loves me…_

This was exactly the reason she wasn't going to go visit him in his Soul Room while they were both asleep. Her dreams were almost always of her Room, and Soul had said that after he went to his for the first time, he's hardly had a dream where he wasn't.

Still…Maka turned the doorknob on his door, finding it open. She figured that meant he was there at the other end of the hallway. But she closed the door again, deciding to try some of the other rooms. They were bound to be interesting as well. There were so many!

"The daydream room? Oh my Death, it has HEARTS on it! And _pink!_" Maka was truly offended by this door. She considered herself to be anti-pink. But she was still curious.

Stepping inside, she magically changed into a pretty ball gown, pleased that it wasn't pink. She felt a weight on her head; she was wearing a tiara!

"Umm…"

"My fair princess! Oh, how I've been waiting for your return—" Said a quite familiar, male voice from across the room, which looked like the room Kid threw his parties in but more medieval. "My dear princess Maka! Oh, how I love you so!"

"Uh . . . Soul . . . what are you doing wearing a suit of armor?" Not to mention his new way of speaking.

"My outfit displeases you, Maka my love?" Soul said, magically changing into his normal suit. That was much more fitting. It was the suit that Maka thought Soul looked the best in.

"But this dress makes me feel like I'm in a fairy tale!" Maka spun around happily. "Is that what this room is? A fairy tale room?"

"It is if you wish it to be, my Princess." He bent down to kiss her gloved hand. A moment later, he presented her with a bouquet of red roses. "For you, though they pale in your beauty."

"Oh . . . thank you, Soul . . . you didn't need to." This was really weird, even for Soul, the, well, king of weirdness. Seriously, when was he going to call her tiny tits? Or bookworm? Even so, Maka was enjoying the gentlemanly side of Soul. "So where are we, anyway?"

"Your daydream room, princess, where you can live out whatever you wish for."

"Oh, so you're _not _Soul, you're just a Soul I dreamed up to be charming and princely." That was a slight disappointment.

"I am Soul! I am a reflection of Soul you created!" This definitely sounded more like him. Perhaps he was trying to imitate the real Soul.

"Same difference." Maka scoffed. This action probably would have pissed off her partner in the real world. That was a nice perk. "Hey, daydream Soul?"

"Yes, my dear?"

"Is there any way I can see what realty Soul is daydreaming about?" It might be interesting, of course. But she is not going to tell him she dreamed of the two of them in a fairy tale location.

"Just imagine it so. If you imagine it to be the truth, it will be."

"Hm, OK, I am imagining a TV screen that will show me the last daydream Soul had."

A TV, much like the one currently sitting in their living room, appeared. A couch was also conjured up, and Maka and her daydream sat and turned it on. She heard what was going on before an image appeared on the screen.

"Mm, Soul, you're _so_ sexy . . . mmm . . . ooh, Soul. . ." Was that HER voice? Why was she, of all people, making out with him? Oh dear, clothes were coming off!

Maka frantically turned the TV off before anything happened. "MAKA-CHOP!" She hit her daydream, who she now dubbed 'Sir Soul' to avoid confusion.

"Hey, what was that for? That's not my daydream, you know! I'm just a reflection!" Sir Soul yelled.

"Reflex." She swiftly apologized. "He is SO dead! How DARE he be such a pervert! Sir Soul, is that really what he's been daydreaming? TELL ME!"

"You imagined whatever you saw to be the truth so you saw the truth…" He said, covering his head to protect himself from future chops.

"He is _not _sexy!" Maka added furiously.

"Or am I?" Sir Soul whispered next to her, getting too close for comfort. "You can dream up anything you want in here, you know."

"I repeat: you are NOT sexy! I'm leaving!" She squeaked and fled the room.

Note to Maka: do not daydream Soul without a shirt on.

…

"Oh my Death!" Maka shot up in bed, sweat dripping down her face.

"Hey Maka, it's time to wake up!" Soul pushed the door opened gently, wondering why Maka looked a little scared. Scared . . . of what? Her eyes were round as she looked up at his face. "Maka?"

Silence.

Maka couldn't get the image of shirtless Soul out of her head. Against her will, she was picturing him standing there in front of her, baring muscles and a distinguishable scar, which was a perfect mirror of her own.

"Hello? Maka?" He waved his hands in front of her vacant expression. "Have you finally gone stupid?"

"Uh…" Maka stuttered, and then yelled, "You are NOT sexy!" as she shoved him out of her bedroom door, slamming it in his face.

"Okaaaaay…" Soul groaned, not happy that Maka had given him any explanation for shoving him out the door. _Not sexy? _He pondered and gloomily sat down at the kitchen table. _Not sexy? _The weapon-meister rolled his sweatshirt sleeve up to his shoulder and flexed his biceps. Sexy guys have big muscles, right? Right?

Did that mean _Black*Star, _out of _all _people, was sexier than he was? What he lacked in height he compensated with muscle! (This said a lot about his insecurity with his height…Gods were usually tall.)

The shock of this thought sent the albino into unwanted tears.

"Don't worry, Soul, I still think you're cool!" Blaire said, hopping up on the table in cat form. Luckily she didn't spill anything over this time. The last time she jumped on the table, precious coffee was wasted…along with a new pair of pants and a relatively peaceful morning.

"You do?" He asked incredulously.

"Of course!" She transformed back into a human, hugged the poor boy, and caused a nosebleed. He tried to cover up his face when he heard Maka's footsteps, but knew it was in vain because her face was red in anger and a book was in her hand.

"Uh-oh…" He prepared for death.

"Maka-chop!" She performed her signature move, and Soul was left dying on the floor. Due to his past experiences with her attacks, he was able to become conscious in a few seconds, and promptly returned to his breakfast.

He pretty much decided that Maka's first outburst of the morning was just her being . . . her, and he would forget about it. However, whatever was going on, Maka was still thinking about it, and was avoiding looking at him.

_You can dream up anything you want in here, you know… _Sir Soul's voice rang in her head. _"Mm, Soul, you're so sexy . . . mmm . . . ooh, Soul. . ."_

"I'm leaving early! Bye!" Maka panicked and grabbed her things. Soul, confounded, ate the rest of her neglected breakfast in what was apparently not sexy silence.

…

Lately, the girls have been meeting up outside of the school before the class bell would ring. Even after becoming deathscythes, young meisters and weapons were still going to school. They would not be taking any classes about how to _become _a deathscythe, of course, but instead how to use their upgraded deathscythe powers. Tsubaki, for example, was working on her form change time.

They had a particular spot near some (symmetrical) desert plants that they liked to meet up at. The twins were trying to comfort a sobbing Maka, who had her knees tucked in to her chest.

Tsubaki approached the group. "Liz, what's wrong with Maka?" She didn't want to disturb the weeping weapon-meister.

Liz pulled a face, as if she thought the reason was stupid but was helping out anyway. She stood up, gave a big sigh, and walked over to the ninja weapon to whisper in her ear, "Maka says she found out that Soul has been having …she said… dirty daydreams about her. I don't _personally _think it's a big deal since he told her he likes her _but…_" 'You know her' was the phrase she wanted to end her sentence.

"Oh my!" Tsubaki exclaimed. "But Maka, it's not _all _bad!"

"It's not?" The blonde looked up at the optimistic Tsubaki.

"Of course not! Look at the positives! At least you know Soul wants to kiss you! That's more than a lot of girls get, always worrying about if their crushes want to kiss them." This, of course, was also true of herself. She was still trying to figure out if Black*Star liked her.

"He was doing more than that…" Maka said with a shudder. Her eyes were widened, and right now she was wishing for some mental soap. "He was . . . was . . . licking my neck and it was gross!"

Liz's face was in surprise; she figured, since it was Maka, after all, a 'dirty daydream' probably consisted of two pairs of lips dueling.

The gun decided to take an easy route to get her to quiet down. "OK, Maka, you have to remember that Soul is a teenage boy and he has hormones. Maybe if you looked at it from a more scientific standpoint you'd feel better."

"Yeah! I'll just think about that! Thanks you guys!" She smiled, thankful that she had friends that put up with her. She wouldn't look Soul directly in the eyes that day, and was doing this odd thing that involved covering up her neck, but she didn't avoid him . . . too much.

…

"I don't get what's wrong with Maka today." Soul complained to Black*Star. The two of them were walking down the school hallway. Soul had his hands deep into his sweatshirt pocket, and his blue-haired friend was walking backwards.

"Why're you asking me? Maka's _your _problem; I'm too godly to worry about her."

"You care about Tsubaki." Soul pointed out.

"Of course I do! In order of godliness, Tsubaki is number two on the list! Following the great me, of course. Be honored that you are even _on _the list." He said in a haughty tone.

He was used to this manner of speaking, of course. Soul wasn't about to let Black*Star change the subject to himself. "It's just . . . she keeps avoiding me, and I don't know why!"

"Seriously dude, why are you asking me?"

"You've known her longer. You guys were neighbors when you were little, right? Maka said that once."

"That was a loooooong time ago. Besides, you know her better than I do. You spend almost all of your time with her! You should spend some more time with ME! We should hang out afterschool."

"That sounds cool. Your place or mine?"

"You should come to the godly me's house!"

…

Playing video games at Black*Star's house was fun, but fights always broke out between the two of them, even if they were on the same team.

"That wasn't fair!"

"Says the one who kisses his pillow at night like a loser." Black*Star said, returning to his game. The two were fighting over . . . well . . . Soul couldn't remember how this one started.

Soul was petrified. "You know about that?"

His blue-haired friend let out a great guffaw. "Be grateful I didn't tell anybody! Dude, watching you sleep is HILARIOUS! You're always, 'Maka, Maka, Maka, oh I love you Maka!'"

"You watch me sleep?" He exclaimed.

"Of course! I have to practice my assassin skills! Besides, watching you sleep is more fun than Kid. He even _sleeps _symmetrically!" What he saw when he spied on Kid was strange—he slept in the exact center of the bed, in a symmetrical position that didn't move through the night. Kid hardly slept though; there was always something to check.

Soul was wondering why he was still friends with this idiot. He decided on his way home from 'Star's house, he'd go buy some security or something. But he didn't want to voice this out loud and give the assassin / creeper any ideas. "You haven't . . . spied on Maka, have you?"

"I couldn't even if I tried. She's never asleep! She's always reading, and that's _boring _to watch. Why?"

"No reason." He was actually just worried.

"Dude! I totally think you want to spy on Maka!"

"WHAT? No, of course not!" Soul denied. Spying _definitely _wasn't cool.

Black*Star seemed to think for a moment (shocking, right?), and decided something. "All right, Soul my bro, if you don't come spying on Maka with me tonight, I'm going to tell the whole school about your pillow fetish."

"God damn it, Black*Star. If you get me caught I am going to kill you. And it is _not _a fetish." His cell phone buzzed, signaling he had a text message.

MAKA

WILL U BE HOME SOON? I HAVE DINNER.

SOUL

I'M STAYING OVER AT STAR'S TONIGHT

MAKA

OK. PLEASE DON'T STAY UP TOO LATE!

"She only says please if she's going to sleep early." Soul told Black*Star. "I guess tonight's the night." 

…

It was two in the morning. Two in the freaking morning, and two boys were jumping on the rooftops of Death City like the true parkour masters that they were. Black*Star had even forced his friend into some of his star-emblazoned clothing to "help", thinking that the clothes had absorbed some of his godliness and assassin skills. Soul felt like an idiot in them, probably because they didn't fit. He was taller than his friend, making the pants look like awkward shorts. At least the god allowed him to wear his original shoes.

They traveled as quickly and silently as they could until they finally reached the Eater-Albarn residence.

"Remember Soul, rule number one, dissolve in the darkness and erase your breath—"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's just get this over with." Soul had to admit, he was a _little _curious, and he felt like he had butterflies in his stomach out of fear and nervousness. He made his way to the little balcony outside of their living room, panicking at the noise the old piece of metal made when he put his weight on it. His plan was to peek in her window to make sure Maka was asleep, and then sneak inside her room. Black*Star then told him he had to be inside the room for at least one minute.

Using the mismatched bricks as hand and footholds, he climbed to the windowsill and slowly glanced inside. Phew! She was asleep.

"Can't I watch her from here, Black*Star?" He called.

"No! You have to get inside and see if she says anything!"

Well, his arms _were _getting tired of brick-climbing… He opened the window carefully—thank death for the renovations the apartment complex got a few months ago—and snuck inside.

He'd been inside Maka's room plenty of times before, pastel-painted walls covered with bookshelves. Soul heard Maka's steady breathing and was reassured. He looked at his watch and held his breath to wait out one minute that felt like an hour.

Finally! 3-2-1…

He was just about to leave when…

"Soul?" Maka grumbled. He froze, hoping she was muttering in her sleep, but she got up and looked straight at him. She woke up. "Soul, what are you doing? I thought you were spending the night at Black*Star's? Speaking of, why are you wearing his clothes?"

"Uh . . . don't believe anything Black*Star says about me!" He slipped outside. He figured that since he was caught Black*Star would tell everybody about…his pillows. This wasn't going to be pretty.

…

We all know that Maka loves her books, but what actually lies in her bookshelf? These are the adventures of our favorite bookworm and her beloved pages.

~Lowest shelf, the fourth book to the left~

She kept her old children's books. True, they were at the bottom of her shelves (the ones at a reachable level were reserved for books she was currently reading) but there were at least ten books that were from her childhood. Of course, she grew out of them pretty quickly, her being a genius and all. Occasionally her mother had to force her out of her room to go play outside with the other children.

"But then _he _makes fun of my hair!" _He _usually referred to the young boy Maka's age that lived across the street. His name was Black*Star.

"Then you remind him that he has blue hair."

"Kami, dear, isn't that encouraging violent behavior? I don't want our little angel making fun of people." Her father said, but her mother scoffed.

"I don't want her to be a pushover! My darling needs to be a tough girl who can take care of herself!" Of course, the woman always wins the argument, so it was decided that they would let their daughter say whatever she wanted, hit stuff, and pretty much act the opposite of the "angel" that they liked to call her.

Anyway, back to the storybooks. Maka loved her mother, but she especially loved when her father would read to her. He was at work a lot, so this was their main father-daughter bonding time.

"Once upon a time, in a kingdom far, far away, there lived a nobleman, his wife, and his daughter, who happened to be a meister. They were happy together. The girl was very beautiful, and had blonde hair with green eyes [just like you!]

"One day, however, his wife died, and he was forced to remarry to another woman. He did not know that his new wife was a witch, and had two ugly meister step-daughters. The witch killed the man and forced his daughter to do all the chores in the house for her.

"The daughter was kind, and would not scorn her step-family even though they made fun of her and named her Cinderella because of the way she would clean the cinders of the fireplace.

"One day, the prince of the land, who was a weapon, was told that he had to choose a meister. Unable to find one of his liking, he decided to throw a large party and invite all of the meisters of the land that were the proper age. When they family received the news, the step-sisters were excited to go.

"'That means I can go too!' Cinderella said, but her step-family laughed at her, for she had nothing to wear to a party at the prince's castle. She cried, knowing that they were right, but suddenly her fairy godmother appeared.

"The fairy had long, dark hair and soft, indigo eyes, and promised to give Cinderella a dress to wear at the party, but it would only last until midnight. She created for Cinderella a big, poofy, purple dress, a carriage she made out of a pumpkin, and a pair of glass slippers. Cinderella thanked the fairy, and hurried off to the party.

"The prince saw Cinderella the moment she walked in, and they started talking. When he was about to ask her to be his meister, the clock struck midnight, and Cinderella ran, leaving one of her glass slippers behind.

"The next day, the prince searched the entire kingdom, searching for the meister whose feet matched the slippers. The last house he checked was Cinderella's. The two ugly step-sisters tried on the slipper, but it didn't fit on either of them. Then, Cinderella appeared with the other slipper. They fit perfectly on her feet, and she accepted the prince's offer to become his meister. They saved the world many times and were very happy. The end."

"Papa, what did the prince look like? You forgot to tell me."

"Oh . . . he had, um, white hair and red eyes, yes, that's right!" He said.

A/n This story is so fun to write! I originally wrote the books for a separate fic but they turned out to be incorporated to what I wrote here, in Soul Trance, so I included them. Not all of them are important to the plot. Anyway . . . welcome to the third in the series!


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Recap! Stein has nightlights?

Dr. Stein was alternating between reading and tip-tapping away at his keyboard. He preferred to work in his office in darkness, but Marie kept hiding night-lights everywhere to keep his rooms lit. "So it won't hurt your eyes." She would say.

Maka had given him so much information! So much more to dissect—he meant study, that's right, study! He decided that before he does anything else, he should review about Soul Rooms, because that seemed to be very important in Soul and Maka's Equilibrium.

"The Soul Room is the place where the soul actually resides. It is near impossible to reach, so there are not a lot of facts known about it.

"What we do know is that every person's Room, although appears the same, has a different Conduit inside to release the person's power. The type of Conduit depends on the person.

"In your Room your soul takes the form of a certain avatar which looks like how the person views themselves.

"It is possible for a second person to enter the Room, when the two people share a deep connection with one another, such as family members, lovers, meister and weapon—

"There exists a Dimension Between Souls where travel between two people's souls is possible. The two souls that are being traveled must be relatively close physically to each other. One travels to their own Soul Room and if it is possible to go to another's, a door will appear with that person's name on it."

Stein wrote in his scientific log [in italics]:

_Maka says that they must be in the same Soul Room when they perform Soul Equilibrium. I theorize that the two must be in perfect harmony at the soul level and not just at the personal level. _

"The Equilibrium is an upgraded form of Resonance. A weapon resonates with a meister at the same time as the meister resonates with a weapon. So it's two times the power, but also more dangerous."

Stein thought it was odd that the only mention of the Equilibrium in the Shibusen Library was in a book merely about famous meisters and weapons. Oh, he'd read that book before, but for looking up famous warriors, not scientific information. Strange…

_The pair has used the Equilibrium twice, both as Soul as the meister and Maka as the weapon. I am certain that they could use it either way, judging by the nature of the attack._

_From what Maka has told me, they have been visiting each other's Soul Rooms frequently. I am advising them against this. I fear that both avatars get stuck in one Soul Room, eventually leaving one body soulless and die while the other's nervous system breaks down from too much information. It is already risky to visit someone else's Soul Room in the first place, and the more they do this the more chance they have of something going wrong. _

_It does not, however, worry me that they are visiting their own Soul Rooms often. Going to one's Room leads to learning more about one's self, and knowledge is strength in its own. For example, simply by knowing one's Conduit tells you what kind of person you are. Maka with her Bookshelf reaffirms that she is a knowledge seeker. The one time I entered my Room, I was in madness, and I can't remember what mine was. I haven't been there since, so I can suppose I congratulate my students in actually succeeding to enter their Rooms so many times._

_Maka tells me that there are many smaller rooms including a Theater that plays back memories. She says she hasn't been to all of them, and will tell me more when she sees them. _

"Franken? It's getting late." Marie poked her head into the office. "Gosh darn it, leaving the light off again! You need to worry about your eyes more!"

"Marie…"

…

"I stayed in Maka's room for one minute before she caught me." Soul told Black*Star after they jumped back to his apartment. "So you can't tell anybody."

The ninja huffed, and said, "Fine. I won't. But I didn't promise I wouldn't take any pictures for Black*Mail! Mwahahahaha!"

"God damn it." Soul swore. To his sort-of relief, though, it was _only _pictures of him wearing Black*Star's clothing. One day, maybe Soul would take some embarrassing pictures of the assassin and put them on Black*Mail, the DeathBook account where Black*Star would post embarrassing pictures of people. Soul's first appearance on B*M was when Maka was going through Weapon's Loyalty, and kissed him at a party. The pictures were mainly for Maka, though. "I'm going to sleep now." He said, stealing a pillow from the couch and getting in the spare sleeping bag.

"Don't make out with my pillows." Black*Star sniggered.

…

Soul sat moodily in his Memory Theater. His, unlike Maka's, had a run-down look. He thought it might be because he tended to not look too hard at the past. He liked to live in the moment. Soul sneezed at some dust and remembered why he was here.

The boy felt like reminiscing for some reason. He hated to use the phrase "soul-searching", but it felt pretty appropriate right now.

The popcorn was imaginary, of course, but it was always a big part of the movie experience. The ratty red curtains swung open.

He was thinking about his childhood. _Before Maka. _That's not to say he left childhood at the age of thirteen, but he found his true self when he met her, and after a few years discovered who he was meant to be. Before . . . he was an odd creature, not deciding if he wanted to be rude or obedient, finding comfort in the keys of the piano that he also hated, and in the embrace of his dear grandmother who showed him warmth where his mother showed nothing at all.

"I'm confused, Granny. I said that I never wanted to go back but I feel that I need to for some reason." He paused the memory, speaking towards the imaginary woman. "I want to see you, have Maka meet you maybe, but I don't want to see Mom and Dad right now."

"Soul, wipe that chocolate sauce off your cheek! Cool guys don't leave food on their faces; you'll never find a lady like that."

"But I hate girls! They're icky!"

The older woman laughed, taking out a tissue from her handbag to clean the evidence of her grandson's candy bar.

"Why're you looking at me like that, Granny?"

"You want to be a cool guy someday, right?"

"Yes!"

"Then I'm going to give you a cool new name. Your cool name is Soul Eater. How do you like that?"

"That's really cool!" The memory ended. Ever since then, he always went by Soul Eater. His family called him that, and he told everybody at school to call him that as well. And when he transferred himself to Shibusen . . . when signing the paperwork he didn't even hesitate to wonder if he should write down under 'name' the name printed on his birth certificate.

Well . . . he supposed keeping his surname would have been all right, but he got rid of that for a different reason. Things would have been a lot different if he hadn't have done that; ways that were _definitely_ uncool.

Flashing lights, giant ballrooms, a giant and gleaming piano looming in front of him…did he dare return to the place that he ran away from? The place that he used to call home? Now home consisted of a two-bedroom apartment that he shared with a hot-tempered girl and a cat that transformed into a scantily-clad woman. It was pretty obvious which one he preferred.

It wasn't because of the seductress of a feline magical being. Really. In fact, if it was up to him, he'd rather have the practically abusive girl walk around half-naked and have the cat suddenly decide she just wants to be a cat. He'd allow her to talk, of course, he wasn't cruel.

Either way, it would be nice to see his grandmother. Maybe he'd get Maka to come with him, they might get along, remembering how many times he would be practicing and his Granny would sit and listen, her nose also buried inside a book.

Was his life plagued by women who either a) read or are b) b for busty? It was possible.

…

Meanwhile, Maka was having fun in her daydream room. She was reliving her favorite fairytale, Cinderella, with Sir Soul playing the prince and a version of Tsubaki playing the fairy godmother. She was such a kind girl, so she was perfect for that part, Maka thought.

Of course, her father told her a different version of the tale. It was the version that every weapon or meister's daughter was told, where the prince was a weapon searching for a meister. She remembered laughing when hearing the story told by Liz, who was telling it to Patti.

"The story's about how kindness can lead to finding a good partner and saving the world!" Maka said to her.

"No, the story's about finding true love!" Liz shouted back, her being the romantic. Even throughout her years living on the streets she always believed she'd find her perfect man somewhere.

"No, it's about finding a partner!"

"It's true love!"

The two sneered at each other and Patti laughed.

Anyway, she had Arachne play the evil stepmother and Medusa and Cleopatra play the evil stepsisters, even though they were witches, not meisters like the story went.

"Will you, Cinderella, be my meister?" Sir Soul . . . ahem . . . _Prince _Soul asked, kissing her on the hand.

"Yes!" She said with a smile, and her pretend ratty servant's uniform changed into the red ball gown, with a few alterations made so she could kick some ass. It was shorter and her glass slippers turned into glass boots. Hmm. Maka knew what she wanted to be for Halloween next year! The only problem would be the boots…

"Maka my love, what's troubling you?" The game was over. The two of them were sitting at the medieval-style banquet table.

"Reality Soul was being weird. He was dressed up like Black*Star and was spying on me!"

"Black*Star probably told him to do it." Sir Soul suggested.

People conjured in a daydream room were a lot like a psychotherapist, where the room was the classic red lounge and the creator the patient. They could repeat ideas or thoughts of the creator first, but then add their own spin. They were meant to help the owner of the room sort through their thoughts and look at things from a different perspective.

They were not like Soul's red demon, which was his own entity that took residence in his Soul Room.

"I'm not like the red demon, Maka." He said, reading her thoughts. She made him, after all. "I am from your imagination; he was part of the black blood's madness."

"Really?" Maka was genuinely worried.

"Yes. If the red demon was from his imagination, like me, he would have gotten rid of him, right?" He rationalized. "For example, you can get rid of me at any moment. I am always prepared to leave at any given time."

"Don't say that you're prepared to leave; you really sound like him. Only, he always says that he's ready to die for me." Maka pouted. She didn't mention that she said once that she'd die for him as well.

Sir Soul reacted immediately. "I live only for you, Maka dear."

"Yeah. I like a more optimistic Soul."

…

~In a box under Maka's bed with all of her other old essays~

Soul sat at his desk and thought about the assignment. Originally he was going to blow it off and write down a bunch of bullshit five minutes before the essay was due, but since the essay was about her, Maka was insistent that he write it _now. _

A whole _week _before it was due.

What _would _happen if Maka had grown up in _his_ family instead of with her mom and dad? This might take a while. Soul finally raised his pencil and started to write.

Soul Eater

Class Crescent Moon

March 28

If Maka was born in my family…

…She wouldn't be a meister. My family is all about music, so I bet Maka would have been forced into piano lessons like I was. She'd probably actually be good at it too, since everybody says everyone in the Evans family has a natural talent for instruments. I somehow can't imagine her being good at the piano since she sucks at it right now.

Anyway, she's a perfectionist and always tries to finish what she started, so I wonder if even though she'd figure out that she had weapon blood she might stick around and play piano more. She wouldn't care what anybody said about her playing, so it having the blood wouldn't give her reason to go. Maka liked to be with her family before her pervert dad ruined it for her. Maka in the real life, that is.

She'd have an older brother. Maka today doesn't like to be protected by anybody, but if she had a brother I bet she'd like to have someone looking out for her. Wes, I think, would probably be one of those brothers always protecting their little sisters. (That's my brother's name.) Oh, and Maka would rather be with someone than lock herself up in her room and be boring. I get bored and sometimes I need her to make the boredom go away since I can't stand being alone. Yeah, anyway…let's see…

I guess Maka would be happy living in my family. She's better suited for it anyways. It would just suck for us because she wouldn't be a meister and wouldn't be able to save the world (again).

…

Maka Albarn

Class Crescent Moon

March 28

If Soul was born in my family…

…He would be a bigger pervert than he already is. He would have lived with Papa! Once he was old enough, Papa would probably take him to that club he always goes to.

Well…maybe I'm wrong. He may be a pervert, but he's also a nice guy when he wants to be, so maybe he'd be like me and take Mama's side. Forget what I said; he would have no perverted qualities at all.

Soul would have grown up knowing he was a weapon (or would he be a meister? He might get both genes like I did) all along instead of finding out one random day like he told me. Therefore his goal wouldn't be to be as good as Mama like mine but to be a deathscythe better than Papa, which would probably make Papa very happy even if it was only to get back at him. They're both scythes, after all.

He'd still be friends with Black*Star since he would live in Death City and Black*Star grew up at Shibusen. I don't know if I would meet him at all, because we met when he was playing the piano and I never had to take piano lessons when I was a kid. I suppose it could have ended up backwards and I would have been the one playing piano instead.

The best part would be that Soul wouldn't be as lazy and would actually do his schoolwork. Or, at least I think so. I don't know if he would be a radically different person, but they say that the environment you were raised in dramatically affects what kind of person you are so I guess so.

…

A/n Always have to have a quick recap over previous stuff! I think it's important in series-format stories. But more importantly, we have to give nightlights to Dr. Stein. Yeah, I ship Marie with Stein. I like them together.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter three: The Evans Haunted Mansion! Soul has a stage name?

"Hmmm…" Maka thought, examining the mission board. Finally they had no pressing _save-the-world-right-now's _(as much as she loved those) so they could work on some normal missions and give her more souls to eat. Sounds delicious!

So there they stood, examining what was offered today. Many of them were for more experienced pairs, so they had to pick something easier. They were also trying not to pick anything _too _easy, for fear of boredom. They decided to at least pick something away from Death City.

"Look at this one, it's in Hollywood! We've never been there!" Maka asked.

"Meh." Was Soul's opinion.

"Seattle?"

"No, Vegas." His eyes were lighting up at the thought. "Maka, we're doing this one!"

"OK!" Maka didn't care that he'd downright chosen one without consulting her first, because she didn't care where they went. If he wanted to go to Las Vegas, then sure, they could go. They've been there before, but only because it had the closest airport. Then, they'd usually connect flights in Denver.

They filled out the paperwork at the counter, signing away waivers and the like until the secretary would officially give them the mission. Sign here, initial here, full name in print goes here. After doing this more than 200 times (100 each for the two times they tried to make Soul a deathscythe, and a few more for Maka), they were used to it. "You leave first thing tomorrow."

…

Maka pulled out the bag they used for over-night missions. It fit perfectly in the compartment under Soul's motorcycle seat, and had two sides so that her things would be separated from his. They were probably going to stay at a hotel for the night, so Maka packed pajamas, a second outfit, and a toothbrush. She also slipped a small book on her side. Satisfied, she brought the bag into Soul's room so he could pack.

"Here's the bag, Soul . . . Soul, what are you doing?"

Soul had situated himself in front of his mirror (when interrogated about owning said object he replied that it was to check his coolness) and was smiling. He smiled, relaxed his face, and then smiled again. Each time he seemed to become more frustrated.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"I'm trying to smile, what does it look like I'm doing?" He turned around to face her for a quick moment, and returned to his training.

"Huh?"

"There's something wrong with my face. I can't smile normally like you guys do! I have to figure out how to smile without smirking!" He explained frantically.

"Soul, if you smiled without a smirk that would be the apocalypse." Maka said. "What brought this on?"

"Nothing. Toss me the bag."

He was hiding something, Maka knew. He wouldn't have answered her question so nonchalantly if he wasn't. He would have ignored her question, and just asked for her to throw the bag over. After a moment, she decided not to look too far into it. If it was something that required him to try to smile without a smirk, it was probably something really, really dumb.

…

"Soul Perception." Maka, human form for now, used her special gift to locate the monster. "North-west of here. Park somewhere and we'll take it from there. He can move fast."

"I gotta better plan. Trust me?" Soul smirked evilly. Maka supposed that meant that his 'smile training' was a failure.

"Of course." Maka said like it was obvious.

"Then hold on!" He ordered, and Maka clung on like a barnacle. If Soul didn't drive over the speed limit before, he definitely was now. His weaving through traffic like the terrible driver he already was added more to their _you-are-so-going-to-get-ticketed _chase.

"I am going to kill you if this doesn't kill us first." Maka said, but he was driving too fast to hear. It also could have been the cars that were honking and screaming at them. "There!" She pointed out the prekishin, who was stalking through an alleyway. It was covered in feathers and sequins, like a bad dancer's uniform, in clashing shades of orange and pink. Not the most evil looking villain, until you saw the knives for arms.

"You have _got _to be kidding me." Maka groaned as she reached for Soul's outreached hand. He was going to charge right into the monster, not taking his foot off the gas pedal, wasn't he?

Holding on to the bike with one hand, he rushed into action and plunged Maka's blade right into the creature's chest. In a move that he swore was choreographed, he used the momentum of the fatal blow to bring Maka right back to her seat. She was quaking with fear, but Soul hit the brakes and came to a quick stop. Too bad there wasn't an explosion—that would have made his crazy move perfect.

"Soul, that was crazy! You broke at least 50 traffic laws, did something completely reckless, scared me half to death—"

"What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, right Maka?" His eyes had a mischievous sparkle to them. It wasn't as powerful as his red-eyed glare or even the dreaded puppy-dog eye look, but it did have some sort of power over his partner.

"I am willing to bet you had this crazy motorcycle plan brewing for weeks, and were waiting to come to Vegas so you could get away with it." Maka said, dangling the prekishin soul above her mouth. She chewed twice, and swallowed happily. "Thank you for a good meal."

"Ready to go get some less yummy but still good food?" Souls were the yummiest food ever, of course, but any other kind of food was sufficient. "I know a place that has good burgers."

"How do you know your way around here so well, Soul? Every time we're here you always seem to know where you're going." Maka asked curiously as he now drove with confidence and within the speed limit.

"Huh? Didn't I tell you? I used to live here."

"Wow! Really?"

"Yeah. I used to play my piano with my family here. We even had our own show. See? Look up there!" He pointed at a bright billboard advertising something called the Evans Haunted Symphony. Soul wondered why they changed its name. Since when was it haunted? He was a tad curious.

"Wow!"

"I bet I could score some free tickets if we show them our Shibusen ID's." He suggested.

"You know that we're not supposed to use those like that." Maka scolded, and then changed her mind, "But sure; let's go." They had broken the law multiple times in the last hour anyway. What's one more broken rule now?

The most Maka knew about her partner's family was that his mother forced him to go to piano lessons and although he liked piano, he didn't like the lessons. He found out he was a weapon soon after, and ran away from home to go to Shibusen. She didn't know about Las Vegas. "So what's the show?"

"Ah, we play instruments together. See?" On closer inspection, the poster said it started in 15 minutes. The line was almost empty, so it didn't take long for the pair to get to the front desk. "Hey. Two tickets." Soul said.

"Soul…"

"Two tickets _please. _There, you happy?"

"That's better." Maka smiled serenely. Geez, sometimes she really did treat him like a child. Well, he deserved it sometimes. He could _at least _use some proper manners and say please and thank you.

"I'd recognize those eyes anywhere! You're the youngest Evans son, aren't you? What are you doing buying tickets? We've been waiting for you!" The man behind the desk fan-squealed. Suddenly, what seemed to be the entire staff of the establishment appeared and spirited Soul away.

"Maka! Maka, save me!" Soul wailed as he unwillingly crowd-surfed.

"I'll be watching you!" Maka called, grabbing her ticket in one hand. Maka scored big time! A front row seat! She ran into the theater as fast as she could. She was ecstatic at the chance to see Soul play the piano again, and even more curious to see his family. Soul's met her parents—isn't it only fair she gets to meet his?

"Hello, Las Vegas! Thank you for coming to the Evans Haunted Symphony!" The conductor announced as soon as Maka sat down. "And as a special treat, tonight the youngest Evans son, the one and only Soul Eater, has returned to play the piano!"

The traditional red curtains opened and revealed groups of musicians, each appearing to be led by a single person. A blonde woman holding a flute to her lips stood in front of other woodwinds and a white-haired man held a trumpet. A second man raised a bow to a violin. All were dressed as horror movie characters, and the extras as ghosts or zombies.

"There he is!" Maka said quietly when she spotted Soul. Somehow in the 30 seconds that he was backstage, he was forced into a suit and was placed unhappily on top of a grand piano bench. He fiddled with the tie before taking a peek at the audience. Noticing Maka's enthusiastic wave, which was practically hitting her neighbor's heads, Soul gave a half-hearted, embarrassed smile and placed his fingers on the appropriate keys.

Soul was holding his talents back, Maka could tell. She figured it was because he hadn't been practicing whatever song they were playing. Even so, whatever song it was, he was still putting his own personal spin on it, sounding dark and spooky compared to the others—who appeared to be trying to do the same thing. Maka loved it and ignored the whisperings around her.

Suddenly, the performance was over. Definitely breaking the rules, Maka rushed up on stage to congratulate her partner personally with a hug.

"Soul, you didn't tell me you had a _girlfriend_~" said the man wielding the violin. He approached Soul and Maka while the two older Evans, who Maka presumed were the parents, were signing autographs.

"Shut up, Wes." Soul said. "Maka, this is my stupid brother."

"What way is that to introduce your only big brother, Soul?"

"I'm Maka, Soul's we-meister. It's very nice to meet you." Maka shook his hand a little weakly; he was famous, after all, and she didn't meet very many famous people outside of well-known deathscythes. At the last minute, she decided to change her introduction to his meister again; she wasn't sure if Soul's family knew about the flip-flop.

"Maka, huh? Never thought my little brother would go for a tiny-tits like you." He teased, but the quick-tempered girl took it personally.

"Only Soul can call me that! Maka-chop!"

"Yeah, what she said!" Soul agreed, giving the unconscious man a sneer. "Maka, did you kill my brother?"

"Don't worry, Soul, I set my Maka-chop to unconscious today. He'll wake up in five seconds and not know what happened to him."

True to her word, the white-haired man shot up. Desperate for revenge, he said, "Come on, _Sol-o-mon, _it's time to sign autographs."

"Do not refer to me by my birth name or I _will _kill you." His face was getting red, highly unusual.

Maka gave him a look that spelled out pure laughter. "Yeah, _Solomon. _Teehee!"

"DON'T CALL ME THAT!" Soul snapped. "OK, fine, _you_ can call me that, but whatever you do, _don't say it in public. _Please." He was going to say _especially in front of Black*Star, _but he didn't want to give Maka any ideas. Now THAT would be the death of him and his cool.

He could almost picture it now—oh, the horror!

Soul's parents went away to supervise cleanup while Wes came to interrogate the two weapon-meisters. "So what'cha doing here?" He began.

"Well, I was just taking Maka to the show when the dude at the counter recognized me and forced me to play with you guys."

"Did you like the score?"

"Considering that you wrote it, I am required to say yes, aren't I?"

"Yeah, I missed you too, Chompers."

Soul grumbled.

Maka now understood why he wanted to come here, to this city. He knew that they would be there. Maka didn't think he wanted to say hello, per se, but to take a quick peek to see how they were doing in secret. It was too bad for him that he'd let slip that he lived here as a child; if he hadn't then he could have just forced her to go to some odd show for seemingly no reason.

Like she wouldn't figure it out. Unless she sat in the very back, it was pretty easy to tell that they were Soul's family.

"Yo, Maka, wanna stay at my parent's house instead of that hotel?" Soul called, snapping Maka out of her trance.

"Sure!"

…

The limo ride was completely silent. The motorcycle, meanwhile, had been commandeered by Wes. Maka was impressed by the limo, and Soul was torn between sticking with his meister and taking the motorcycle. Decisions, decisions…Maka won.

"Don't worry, I promise I won't crash it, Chompers!"

Soul was now fixated at the window, resisting the urge to stick his head out there like a puppy.

The stiff parents said nothing; the most Maka's heard them speak was to call the limo around and confirm it was OK for Soul and Maka to spend the night.

Combined with Maka's inaptitude to figure out something to talk about, there was no sound except for the light—was it piano?—music coming from the speakers.

Finally she decided on something simple to do. She poked Soul on the shoulder and asked how far from the house they were.

"The gate's just around the corner." He replied swiftly.

A massive metal gate separated the asphalt driveway with a gravel road. Wait—weren't Soul's family rich or something, to own a limo and for Mrs. Evans's multi-caret earrings and rings? She even had the stereotypical fur around her neck. They had cleaned up the movie makeup long ago.

When she pictured a mansion, she thought of large, marble columns, swimming pools, vast foyers, and her Barbie Dreamhouse (which she rebelliously painted to avoid the pink). Instead, they neared a ramshackle, wooden house that definitely couldn't be called a mansion if not for its size. Maka turned to Soul, who seemed to understand her question.

"My Dad is obsessed with ghosts and collects haunted buildings from around the world. This one, our main house that we live in, is the most haunted building in Nevada, after every single building in Death City."

"He _collects _houses?"

"Yeah. How do you think I was able to adjust to all the skulls and shit around Shibusen? Why we're so freaky?"

"Watch your mouth, Soul Eater." The mother said forcefully. What did he say?

"Sorry, Mom." He mumbled out of habit.

"So, then, what's Soul Eater, if that's not your real name?" Maka asked him next.

"That's my stage name, duh." Soul explained. "Don't want to be going around with an uncool name like mine. I decided to make it my real name when I transferred to Shibusen."

"How'd you get it?"

"My Grandma gave it to me." He smiled fondly.

…

~Blaire's room, on the nightstand~

"Oh, Maka likes romance novels too? Blaire will let Maka borrow some of hers~!"

"Thanks, Blaire!" Maka took a few that looked interesting and went back to her room to read. She preferred to read out in the living room, but Soul and the others were being noisy. Maka blamed Black*Star for bringing over some new video games.

Suddenly she was really, really glad she was reading in her room. Her face paled as she read a certain paragraph and she threw the book across the room as if it were a germ.

"This is . . . this is . . . SMUT!" Maka felt like dying of embarrassment. She should have known! These were from Blaire, after all.

"Hey, Maka, something happened to the TV, it's not working . . . why are you in the corner like that?" Soul said. He let himself in, despite how he knew Maka hated when he did that. It wasn't like he caught her changing . . . much. Nine times total, once on purpose, twice naked. Um. He probably shouldn't be keeping track of that. And no, the on purpose one wasn't one of the…never mind.

"I didn't just read that, I didn't just read that, I didn't just read that." Maka chanted, and then fell silent. She tried to make herself very small and hide. She didn't notice Soul's entrance, though.

"Hmph. Didn't read what? Hey, what's this?" Soul picked up the offending book (oh crap!) and read the page where Maka left off. "HOLY—"

"I didn't just read that." The albino joined Maka in her emo corner, but then noticeably scooted a few inches away.

"Soul, buddy! Why aren't you out here? We fixed the TV!" Soul pointed at the book which was placed on the bed. "The book? Hmm…Tsubaki! I need your help!"

"Yes, Black*Star?"

"Read this to your God. Apparently it is causing my disciples to cease their worship."

"Um, OK, Black*Star…"

The emo corner gained two more party members.

"What's wrong in here? My asymmetry sense is tingling." Kid and the two sisters now entered the room.

"Hey! Isn't that the book we borrowed from Blaire, sissy?"

"Kid! Wait! Don't read that!" The elder Thompson sister waved her hands around frantically, but she was too late.

"This love scene is unsymmetrical! I didn't just read that…"

"I wanna sit with Kid! I didn't just read that…"

"Sit on my other side, Liz! I didn't just read that…"

"_Fine." _


	4. Chapter 4

Soul Trance!

Chapter four: Perception! Maka meets a hero?

"Where's Grandma?" Soul asked the first servant he found in the house, the woman who opened the giant door.

"In the sitting room, waiting for your arrival." She scurried away, probably to gossip about Soul returning.

"C'mon, Maka, you have to meet her!" He seemed so excited about reconnecting with his elder, and for Maka to meet her for some reason. Soul pulled at Maka's arm, the one that wasn't lugging the small bag that contained clothes and essentials for their already-planned overnight stay.

"Soul, slow down!" On and on he dragged her through a maze of creepy hallways covered in cobwebs. It was a good thing fighting Arachne had gotten rid of Maka's slight fear of spiders. Of course she wasn't afraid! She was only startled when she'd catch eye of one in the bathtub…_Soooul, kill it kill it kill it kill it! Ewwww…_

He could be annoying at times, but he was sure useful for killing bugs, reaching high objects, and most importantly opening jars. And, until recently, cutting things open when she couldn't find the scissors. Now she could do that herself. Might as well not keep any sort of blade in the house! Well . . . sometimes Blaire needed scissors too, to cut off tags off newly purchased 'clothes' and they had to keep at least one knife in the house to cut meat with. In fact, Maka learned in her weapon's class that 12% of weapon or meister deaths were due to improper use of the weapon, which included using blades as cooking devices… Still, the convenience of it all was tempting, so they both swore to wash their scythes before cooking with them. Just in case.

Soul quickly turned the corner to enter a small sitting room, full of bookshelves, and two large chairs and a couch surrounding a coffee table. The room was warm and cozy, and felt more alive than the creepy rest of the house.

"Granny!" Soul cried, and Maka bore witness to their (uncool looking) reunion.

The older woman took notice of Maka, and gestured for her to sit across from her. She was older than she looked, probably because of the invention of Botox. She wore a plain, red dress with multiple layers of expensive-looking necklaces. Two cardigans draped over her shoulders and her hair was pulled up in a bun held up by chopsticks. She had an air of mystery that Maka couldn't quite place.

She talked to her grandson for a long time until Soul stood up.

"Bathroom," Soul explained quickly as he left Maka and his Grandmother in the sitting room. Maka didn't know what to say to her.

"So…" The blonde began, trying to start some small talk, but she was interrupted.

"There's something strange about your soul, dearie. I sense both weapon _and _meister…oh and what's this? A grigori-type? You are truly blessed." The old woman said in a motherly manner. She was like the grandmother figure that Maka didn't have; both sets of her grandparents lived overseas and they didn't run into each other often.

"You have Soul Perception?" Maka said excitedly. "That's amazing! I didn't know people who aren't meisters can do that."

"Is that what you call it at the Academy? No, no, this is my Soul Séance. I read the characters of the souls to pass them to the afterlife, among other things. They call me an exorcist."

Maka was bouncing up and down in her seat. How exciting to meet someone like this! She'd never read about anyone with powers like these. The lady sitting in front of her could even read the characters of the soul and the dead wavelengths; only the most powerful meisters could do that. Stein admitted when he gave a lecture that even _he _couldn't read the dead wavelengths.

What were dead wavelengths? Well, the first property of soul wavelengths is that they cannot be created (except for birth) nor destroyed. Even in death a person's soul emits a faint glow; one can tell how long the body has been dead by examining how strong the wave is. Special training was required for this, and not just any meister with a hint of Soul Perception could do it.

"Tell me about your beautiful soul, Miss Maka."

_Beautiful? _"I'd rather talk about your Soul Séance! I've never heard of anything like it!"

"Ah, let's see…I will give you a full reading…" The woman closed her deep eyes, opened them, clutching the beaded necklace she wore around her throat. "You have a strong soul. Always seeking knowledge, hot-tempered but kind. I also see you love my grandson very much. It's so strong, the bond between you two . . . that is what I see in you. You deserve the Angel's soul."

"Thank you." Was all that Maka could say.

"What do you see in me, Granny?" Soul was waiting in the doorway, enjoying eavesdropping as always.

"Hmph. I don't have to read your soul to know you've changed. I know my boy. She's changed you into a better person. So brave. I guess you could say you grew up by the last time I saw you? But you'll always be my little guy." she giggled. "Ah, yes, and your weapon and meister blood activated too. I figured as much."

"You knew I was a weapon-meister and you never told me?" He yelled after blushing when his grandmother patted him on the head and ruffled his hair.

"Calm down, calm down, my little cool guy. . . I knew you had the blood but it didn't _necessarily _mean that you would transform. . ."

"It's a simple property of genetics, Soul. Meister blood is a recessive gene, and—" Maka recited.

"Spare me the science lecture."

Grandmother Evans laughed at their antics. Still, when she looked at them together, there was something troubling her. Why were their souls . . . overlapping? Was it something to do with their soul resonance? Surely Maka must know about the overlap already. She was a brilliant student and probably knows the answer. The woman knew she did not know everything about her power; she guessed that the girl who was arguing with her grandson knew more about it than she did, coming from _that school_.

When she found out her "little cool guy" had found his powers and consequently ran away from home to go to Shibusen, she did some research on the school and knew it was the best place for him.

She admitted Soul was her favorite grandson. How could he not be? He was so cute when he was little, always going on about being cool and playing with his piano. She watched the news and ordered the Death City newspapers to keep an eye on him, unknown to his parents. In her office she kept a sort of shrine to both her grandsons, pulling out articles about Soul becoming a deathscythe and Wes's musical achievements.

She wondered if she was even prouder that her "little guy" had found such a special girl. "Settle down, both of you; I can hardly hear myself think."

Both of them shut up; Soul because when he got in trouble she would smack him on the head, _hard_, (hence why he was still alive after a million Maka-chops) and Maka because, well, Soul's Grandmother might be a new hero for her.

"Did you know, Soul, that I gave you your name because you were a weapon." She revealed. "Yes, I know, here's where you say 'you should have told me'." She ended sadly. Soul's eyebrows were furrowed in frustration. He was clearly angry, but wouldn't lash out on his grandmother. "But I had my reasons. I wanted to tell you, but knowing would have changed your childhood for the worse. I wanted to protect you."

Maka placed her hand on Soul's shoulder for comfort. It was a betrayal, to him. But he also knew that she was right.

"It was unfortunate that when your powers activated I wasn't there for you. I'm sorry." She apologized.

"No, Granny, it's OK." Soul said finally. "What's done is done."

"The Evans' scythe blood is powerful in you. It's no wonder you're such a wonderful deathscythe."

That made him smile. Even a cool guy like him enjoyed the motherly praise she gave him. He could do without the hair-ruffling though. Especially after Maka joined in.

"And he has pretty hair, too."

"Stop it." He complained childishly, and swatted their hands away. Maka figured he became even _more _of a child in his family's presence. That seemed only natural.

The elder woman took a glance at her sparkling, diamond-encrusted watch. "You'll be coming with me for dinner?" By the tone in her voice, this was an order, not a question.

Soul's stomach grumbled.

"Soul! That's rude! Yes, please, if that's all right with you…"

"Sorry." He muttered, causing a laugh. He should have known Maka would get along just fine with his grandmother. That was just a talent she had. Maybe this unexpected visit wasn't so bad after all.

…

Or maybe it was. Eating (devouring) dinner in such a strict and stiff setting was extremely awkward. Soul longed for the mess and familiar ritual that was dinner at the Eater-Albarn residence. No excessive manners (as long as he used utensils and a napkin, anything goes) and if there was silence, it was probably just because they were tired and didn't feel like moving their mouths any more than what was necessary to chew and swallow.

Maka made a mean spaghetti sauce, too. Don't get him wrong, the food he tasted was good, prepared by 5-star chefs, but it lacked the love that his partner would put into her cooking. He wondered if Maka sensed it too.

It was the mother that began the small talk. "Miss . . . Maka was it? How did you like the Haunted Symphony?"

"Oh, it was lovely! I really enjoyed hearing Soul play with all of you." Maka said. "I still think he's wonderful playing by himself too."

"Hmm, yes." The mother hummed in a bland agreement.

"Well, I for one think his performance rounded out our overall sound." Wes said, always the older brother who looked after his rebellious counterpart. They looked very much alike, the two brothers, Soul's teeth being the main difference.

The parents, however, were a different story. They appeared hostile, and Maka wondered if her observation of them ignoring their son was correct. In fact, she didn't hear a word come out of the father's mouth. It made her almost miss her Papa, who could talk a mile a minute (though she didn't want to hear it).

Soul was acting odd too. He slumped in his seat, next to his brother's, and made himself small. True, he looked shorter than his older brother, but that was just because Wes was freakishly tall. He kept looking up at his parents, willing them to talk to him but they wouldn't; they just kept talking to Wes about the night's concert.

Maka couldn't take it anymore. "Talk to him!" she shouted, getting up from her seat to slam the table with a fist. Silence.

"Maka—" Soul started, not wanting to be defended by her. "If they don't want to say anything then that's their deal—"

"No, Soul. I know you better than that. If you didn't want to talk to them then you wouldn't have suggested we go see the show. You wouldn't have told me about it otherwise." Maka retorted.

"Well…" He knew she was right, of course. She (almost) always was.

"So here's what's going to happen," Maka continued, "You two are going to listen while Soul says something to you. Then you're going to respond. This is going to repeat until I say you can stop. Go."

Mr. and Mrs. Evans looked at the girl, confused and slightly intimidated, then faced their son.

"What should I say?"

"Say something."

"Something." He received the evil eye. "OK, OK…umm…how are you?"

Wow. So uncool, Maka thought. But she didn't interrupt.

"We're good. How are you?" Mr. Evans spoke. His voice could be described as a deeper version of his youngest son's.

"I'm cool." He said. "Maka, do I really have to do this? I don't know what—"

Suddenly, he jumped up in surprise as two people came up from behind to hug him. In Soul's mind, the last two people on Earth who'd hug him, even Kid. He wasn't allowed on the list. "—to say."

"We're sorry," They mumbled as Soul struggled to figure out what to do. Should he keep his cool? Oh well, no one was looking, except for Maka, who always made him uncool. Said girl was smiling triumphantly.

"Yeah. Missed you too." He admitted.

"We just didn't know where you were, or what you were doing, or if you were even alive—"

"I won't die. I'm a deathscythe and I kick ass."

"Wash your mouth!" Hug officially over. Soul was half-relieved. Next, he tried to explain most of their adventures in about 10 minutes (Death the Kid started crying miles away for no apparent reason as it wasn't eight). Maka kept butting in, but she would include what Soul called "Shibusen vocabulary" such as "soul wavelength" and "resonance" and the like, so Soul would reply, "Just let me do it."

"That's all well and good, but did you ever play the piano?"

Of course they would ask that. "I play it for Maka."

"And Maka is your . . . master?"

"Meister. She's the one who wields me." (Maka was giggling inside)

"She also," Cut in the Grandmother, "shares the same powers as I have. I should very much like to teach her what I know."

"Really?" Maka said, trying unsuccessfully not to look overly hopeful.

"I was going to suggest they stay here a few days so I can teach her." Her true scheme came out.

"Sounds like a plan to me. Anyone care for some tiramisu?"

…

"As your meister, I say that you come up here with me." Maka and Soul were arguing over who was going to sleep where in Soul's bedroom. Soul said she could have the bed, she being the girl, after all, but Maka insisted she take the floor because it's his room. Selfishly he decided to take her offer, but only if she'd be there too.

But damn him, taking advantage of that again. Meisters always get the final call in an argument. "Well, as _your _meister, I say that don't try anything funny."

The bed frame creaked, but the mattress inside was a dreamy Memory Foam, and Maka decided she could ignore her snuggling meister. Was it possible to be hugged to death? She hoped that if she were going to die, it wouldn't be by that.

"'M've you." He mumbled.

…

_~Teen Weapon, a girl's magazine, under Maka's bed~_

The magazine is open to a circled and scribbled on page.

Does he like you? Teenage Meisters and Weapons are busy, so use this test to see if he has a crush!

You ask him for help on your homework. He replies:

Huh? I was asleep.

Sorry, I'm too busy writing my name

Homework? I'm too great for homework.

You're in trouble! He…

Jumps out to protect you

Keeps battling

Had no clue you needed help

He wears…

Something cool, with a trademark accessory

A suit

Anything, so long as it has a star on it

His favorite saying is…

That is so uncool.

That is unsymmetrical!

I will surpass God!

His special talent is…

A musical instrument

Perfectionism

Assassination

It's time to leave for a mission! His vehicle of choice is…

A motorcycle

A skateboard

His own two feet

…Mostly A's…your cool partner definitely likes you!

…Mostly B's…he's a great friend, but is probably too crazy for you to handle

…Mostly C's…who could put up with such a partner?


	5. Chapter 5

Soul Trance!

Chapter five: Soul Séance! Maka takes some lessons?

"OK, sit down and take a deep breath. Close your eyes." The Grandmother ordered and placed her necklace around Maka's neck. "Hold the necklace, Maka."

"Why? Does it do anything?"

"No, it's for show. It's just a family heirloom, a set of pearls, diamonds, and a few garnets." They really _were _loaded, weren't they? Maka didn't care much for jewelry (it got in the way of fighting), but she did what she was told anyway. "Feel your soul. It's located right here between your tiny-tits."

"Only Soul can call me that!" Maka remembered the words of her favorite talk show host—don't let your temper get away from you. Sticks and stones, Maka, sticks and stones. Also, why were they (the Evans family, that is) so obsessed with breasts? Especially her own?

"Yeah, what she said!" Soul said. It wasn't helping.

The old woman laughed in response. Bugging these two was highly amusing. "Feel it grow. Yes, that's right. Now you can speak the words if you'd like, but it's not necessary. Then open your eyes and look at Soul."

"Soul Séance."

She could see it clearly; she'd used her Perception on him before, as practice, which was probably why he was so obedient to help her practice with this. He was used to it. But this time, it was not just a sphere of light with a squiggle on top.

"What does it look like?"

"It's half-black and half-red, and there's things mixed in with it…"

"Keep going."

"The colors are zig-zag, like his scythe! Maybe that's what tells me he's a weapon? I see…there's a smudge on it, it's black too…I think it might be the black blood…maybe it stained it…and what's that?"

"What's what?"

"That looks like . . . never mind." She must be seeing things, if a single grigori wing was protruding from one side of his soul. How strange! "Oh, it's over. I lost my concentration for a moment."

"Are you tired? Such a powerful reading might drain your strength a little."

"I'm fine." Her eyes were a little blurry for a quick second, almost like adjusting your eyes when you suddenly walk in a light room.

Soul spaced out as the two females discussed what could be gleamed from what Maka saw. The apprentice was right that the two colors meant that he was a weapon; in time, she might be able to figure out the type of weapon as well. Meister souls glowed more than others, she explained. As for the fingerprint-shaped stain, that was probably the black blood, but Grandmother Evans didn't know what that was.

Her voice suddenly turned serious when Maka described the fledgling wings that were growing. "Maka dear, I don't know what's happening between you two, but when you are near each other your souls are overlapping."

"I don't understand."

She drew a quick sketch. "It looks like this. I've never seen anything like it. It worries me."

The student analyzed the drawing in her hands. "During Soul Resonance the souls touch, but not overlap like this." It wasn't even like when one soul swallows another. That was good, at least. But still, what could have caused this? The Equilibrium. It must be. Her face perked up at this conclusion, but that was a story for another time. "I think we'll be fine." She said.

The Grandmother nodded, trusting the girl who had studied at the Academy. "Let's try reading the characteristics. Soul, honey, clean your face off. No manners even in his sleep, this one." He rolled his eyes this time, risking a second scolding. He'd been awake, but only catching half of the words. "Maka, use your powers again, but this time focus deeply on his eyes. The eyes are the window to the soul."

"OK." Maka followed the ritual, closing her eyes with the necklace, which she was half-afraid to touch since it was worth thousands of dollars. She stared hard into the red abyss, making him quite uncomfortable.

"You will feel his emotions in your body. You must feel what it feels like to be him." She explained. "You might think you're seeing things, but those are memories. You might hear things. Just pay attention. Now everybody stay silent." The last order was directed at Soul, who felt funny. He wanted desperately to escape Maka's stare.

She saw his life pass before her eyes. Emotions racked her body; perhaps what he was feeling at each event? It was a rollercoaster of feelings. Words came to the forefront of her mind, written out in his illegible scrawl. "Soul is . . . brave. He cares a lot but doesn't show it. Prideful and stupid, because he thinks down on himself. And…"

"Maka, stop mind-raping me! It feels funny!" He broke the eye contact.

"I'm not! Whatever that's supposed to mean…" Maka was confused. "Besides, you consented."

"What? Grandma…" He wailed. She was not amused, and unsurprised. Soul got no protective pat on the head like he wanted. How uncool.

"Good job, Maka. Now, we should try it on someone you're not as familiar with. Soul, Maka is not mind-raping you. Why don't you go get your brother? We only need him for about 10 minutes. I think he's in his practice room."

…

"So what are we practicing?" The more mature of the two brothers asked, sitting in front of Maka.

"Mind-raping. Maka is a serial mind-rapist." He said matter-of-factly.

"WHAT?"

"I am _not. _Soul is being an idiot." She scoffed. She didn't notice the two nodding conspiratorially to one another. Seems like Wes would rather believe Soul after all, even if they haven't seen each other in years. Still, he was interested in how this worked, and it was a nice break from his practicing.

"Soul Séance." Maka recited, getting the hang of it. She saw events of his life now, seeing an overworked boy holding a violin until his arms hurt. He was happy to hear praise, but not overly so. She saw him as a teenager, spying on his brother, until he figured out what he was doing. There had been something wrong with him, he felt, but his parents wouldn't tell him what was going on.

"The weapon gene." Soul finally revealed.

Wes didn't mention that he'd seen him transform before, one day where he opened the door to the bathroom, not realizing Soul was in there. Soul didn't realize Wes was there either; he was too busy changing his arm back and forth. It was lucky for him that Wes didn't scream. "Granny will be surprised."

He was sad when his brother left, but knew it was going to be okay.

Maka couldn't see or hear anything anymore, and the words appeared: "Your hard work has paid off; you're very talented. You're not the most emotional guy out there, but you also have a soft spot for Soul. That's really cute."

"What did his soul look like, compared to his brother's?" Grandmother said.

"They look very similar!" She noted. "But the colors were less intense. He wasn't glowing either."

"And what does that say?" She asked, sounding very much like a teacher at the moment.

"He doesn't have meister blood, but I think he might be a carrier of the Weapon Gene."

"Huh?" Wes asked, worried for his well-being.

"It's a simple property of genetics, Mr. Evans. You get two sets of genes, one from your mother and one from your father. The Weapon Gene is recessive, so in order for it to show up your mother _and_ father have to have it. Then it's some easy probability to see if the child gets both, none at all, or only one. You only got one, so you're not a Weapon. Does that sort of make sense? It's kind of hard to understand."

"I _think _I follow. So, then, Soul happened to get the Gene from both Mom and Dad, so that's why he's a Weapon and not me?"

"Exactly! But, since you're a carrier, if you have children with someone who also has the Gene, your child might be a Weapon. I just hope if you do you'll do the right thing and send them to Shibusen so they can learn to use their powers correctly. Bad things happen to young Weapons who don't." She looked down sadly; there were many accidental injuries and even deaths that have happened.

"I see." Wes said. "So, then, if I have a child that's a Weapon, will they be a blade like Soul is?"

"Probably. They're still researching about which Weapons are more likely to happen than others. He's a scythe, to be precise. Scythes are rare though. It's only him, my stupid Papa, and me that are scythes at the Academy."

"You?"

"Hm-mm." Maka said. "I get it from Papa."

"Soul, wake up! I want to see you fully transformed!" It was brave of poor Wesley, who was being bombarded by information, to attempt to wake up Soul. Lessons always made him fall asleep. Maka's voice had the tone of a lecturer as she explained all this to Wes and his Grandmother. Soul wondered if she'd be a teacher someday and replace Stein and Marie.

She'd love it, that's for sure.

"Finally, something cool for me to do! Let's go outside for this." He suggested. The sitting room was cramped, and he might hit an expensive vase or knick-knack by accident. Not that he cared, of course.

The group ran outside to the backyard, an expanse of green lawn surrounded by native desert plants. The brand-new pool clashed with the haunted look of the mansion itself. It beckoned for them to jump in it.

The glowing light of the transformation was prettier than the garden though, and they were in wonder as Maka twirled the weapon around with ease. Show-off.

"Oh, how beautiful." The old woman said.

"Can I hold him?" Wes asked.

"You wouldn't be able to. Only meisters can touch weapons, since their soul wavelengths can match." Maka explained. "When I wield Soul, I must adjust my wavelength to his. The closer I get the more powerful we will be in battle. Normal humans can't adjust their wavelengths, so you'd be shocked by him, like when you get hit by static electricity."

"Like hell I'd let you anyways." Soul added, showing his face's reflection for the first time. Wes was startled.

"What the heck, Chompers! You scared me!"

"You are so uncool, Wes. And stop calling me that!" He showed off his trademark teeth to him, probably the source of his nickname. Maka wondered if any of them actually called Soul by his birth name.

"Soul, there's something I have to show you." Grandmother Evans remarked. "It's in the attic."

…

The group poured over the photo album that Granny had ordered Soul to pull down. Wes had gone back to work at this point.

"Ah, here it is. This is a picture of your great-grandfather. You take after him." It was true; all Evans men shared the same white hair and red eyes. Soul's skin color and eye shape came from his mother, however. The man in the photograph also had the sharp teeth that Soul was known for. "And this is a picture of him when he graduated from Shibusen Europe Branch. I'm surprised you've never heard of him. He was quite famous."

This picture had a young woman in it too, her skin dark and her hair a black braid running over her shoulder. She held her weapon proudly. The scythe in her hands shared Soul's red-and-black coloring and giant red eye.

"Why do you think the Evans family crest is red and black?" She asked of Soul. "It even has scythes in it. It's hidden in plain sight that the family has weapon blood!"

"I didn't notice."

"You should study your family history when you get back to school. I bet you'll find some interesting things." Soul had a secret love of history, especially music history. He also liked old architecture. He just hoped this wouldn't require too much reading; maybe he'd find a documentary at the library or do some research online. Another option, of course, was to make Maka go get the books for him, but he wouldn't do that.

"You should! I'll go with you; maybe we could both research our families together. Skipping my stupid Papa, of course."

"Shouldn't you call them to let them know we'll be here a few more days?"

"Oh yeah, I'll go do that." Maka left the attic happily; it was even creepier than the rest of the haunted mansion.

"Maka really likes you, Granny." Soul said. "Figured she would."

"She's a nice girl." The woman agreed, and teased, "You two are so cute. Oh, I can just see it now: my little cool guy saying 'I do' to his meister! You'd live in a little cottage in the countryside and have little white-haired kids trailing after their daddy."

"GRANNY!"

"So easy to tease." She pinched his cheeks like a typical grandmother would. She was far from normal, however, and Soul always took that in mind.

"Besides, we'd live in Death City, probably in that apartment we were thinking of buying someday, and I'd have a kid who's a scythe, and we'll work for Shinigami and…I've said too much."

She smirked.

…

Meanwhile, Maka was making a phone call in Soul's bathroom. "4242564, whenever you need him, knock on Death's door!" She sung as the phone rang exactly eight times before Kid dared to pick it up.

"Oh, hello Maka. Was your mission a success? I thought you'd be back by now."

"Sorry, Kid, I forgot to tell you earlier that we will be here a few days. We ran into Soul's family here, and we're staying at their house."

"That must be good for him."

"Yes. But listen! Soul's grandmother, she's not a meister, but she has this different sort of Soul Perception! It's amazing! She calls it Soul Séance. Have you ever heard of it?"

"No; I haven't. Tell me about it." Kid wasn't as passionate about knowledge as Maka was, he was more obsessed about symmetry, but he did like to stay informed about what was going on in the world. It was his job to protect it, after all.

She explained it in great detail, saying that she was learning how to do it too.

"MAKA! Maka my angel, where are you? Come home to your Papa! He misses you!" The red-haired deathscythe also known as Maka's father rushed up to the mirror. "Where are you?"

"That's none of your business. So Kid, as I was saying—"

"Where's Soul? He better not be—" Spirit continued his angry rant.

"With his Grandmother. Can I talk to Kid now?"

"I'll tell Dr. Stein about what you've said to me. Maybe he knows something." Kid said once Spirit had been pushed off the screen and given some Maka and Kami dolls. That always shut him up.

"Thanks, Kid. Have a symmetrical evening!"

"You too, Maka! Eat something symmetrical for dinner. Pizza, cut into eight slices." He suggested for no reason. Maka hung up.

…

Dinner was not symmetrical pizza. It was pasta. The plates, expertly drizzled with sauce, looked stunning and highly appetizing.

Suddenly, the meal was blending together and Maka's vision was going fuzzy.

"Soul . . . I don't feel so good. . ." Maka said. "I keep seeing everybody's souls when I'm not trying to, and it's making me dizzy."

"It's never made you dizzy before. Granny?"

"I think she's overworked her Perception today. I was a fool for allowing her to use her gift so many times in one day, much less two full readings. Maka, dear? Are you OK?"

Her eyes were growing hazy, and she kept looking around, as if seeing things that weren't there. Soul placed the back of his hand on her forehead and announced, "She doesn't have a fever. But she's acting funny."

"She needs rest. Soul, why don't you take her back to your room and let her sleep? I promise she'll be better in the morning." Granny said. "She's confusing the Séance world with this one. She's seeing memories along with reality. This is what happens if you use the gift too much in one day."

"C'mon, Maka…" He pried her up off the table, where she was muttering to herself.

"Wuz goin' on? Oh, Soul! Why're you so young? You're so cute!" Maka said, leaning on Soul. "Where're we going?"

"Maka—"

"No, wait, let me guess! Hmm, let's see…maybe the kitchen to bake a cake?"

"No."

"The garage so he can fix his bike?"

"No."

"Oh, I know! I bet he's going to take me to his room 'cause he wants to-?"

"MAKA, SHUT UP!"

"Soooul! That hurts my ears!" She complained.

"Sorry. Now take your shoes off and go right asleep, OK?"

"Soul, I'm scared." She said, looking around. "Your soul is so big, and it's meshing with mine! There's another you, over there, you're with Black*Star . . . and now you're with me again, and you feel happy. . ."

"Maka, you're doing a reading when you're not trying. You need to sleep."

"Stay close to me, so I know where you are." Maka said when Soul started to leave.

"Maka, it would be best if I left so you're not confused."

"Please."

…

"Hey, Soul~" The facsimile of Maka said when he entered the dreaming room.

"Oh, I don't need you today. I was thinking of dreaming about something else tonight." He shut his eyes and the room began spinning. Maka's clone screamed with anger. _How dare you erase me! SOUL!_

~5th from the right, 3rd shelf~

There it was; Soul's least favorite book. Why? It was the longest, largest, and the heaviest book that Maka owned. He was sure there were larger, but he made a point not to let her have anything bigger or he was sure to die.

The History of Witches, Meisters, and Weapons volume IV

It is hard to believe nowadays, but back in the past, witches and humans were of the same species. Carbon dating on ancient Homo Sapiens reveal that sometime in the past they split into two entirely different species.

Ancient texts says that there was a grand civilization made of two clans who had made peace of this ancient species living somewhere near what is now Nevada when the split happened. It was written that a being came down to the city's two leaders and asked them each to choose a new ability for their people. The two leaders could choose the same ability, different abilities, or none.

The leaders decided to pick different ones, and promised to use the two to work together in their society even if they were opposing. The clan who named their selves witches chose magic, and the clan named humans chose love.

They lived together for a while. But, seeming as the humans could only love humans, they began to break apart from the witches. In retaliation, the witches used their magic for battle, and being inferior except for in numbers, decided to live apart. The witch clan created a new settlement far from the original site.

The identity of the mysterious "being" that appeared is debatable and there are many theories to who or what that might be. Testimonies from witches claim that he was a kind hearted soul in corporeal form who meant no harm. Many humans theorize that he was some sort of god or deity. Some experts think that it was related to the ancestors of Shinigami, but there is no evidence.

After the witch-human split, the humans who gained the ability to love spread until they found all of the other human settlements. Centuries of reproducing gave all of humankind the ability to love.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6: Souls! Wanted dead or alive?

Soul's second-least way to wake up was to the sound of Maka shrieking like a banshee. "SOUL! Soul, wake up! Your house really _is _haunted!"

The weapon hid under the covers to shield his ears from the noise.

"Soul, where are my clothes?"

He liked where this was going. The thought woke him up completely, no coffee required, but was disappointed to see that it was just Maka searching around the room for something. Where were they? On her body already.

"Have you gone insane? What are you looking for?"

"The suitcase! It has all my clothes in it! What did you think I was doing when I said I—you're sick."

"'S my job." He smirked. "They probably took the suitcase to wash everything, idiot. If you weren't screaming at the crack of dawn it'd be washed by the time you woke up."

"Oh." She sighed, feeling like the idiot Soul accused her of being. "But it's not the _crack of dawn. _I just wanted to sneak over to the kitchen and cook something for breakfast."

He liked where this was going, too. "I want eggs. Three. Scrambled."

"I'm not going down in my pajamas." Maka said, knowing she'd be bullied into making his breakfast no matter if she said no.

"Well then, it's a good thing all of the old stuff in my closet would fit you just fine." He was surprised to see how much he'd grown in his time away.

"You better not watch me, or I'll set my Maka-chop to death mode."

"Of course I won't. Now would'ja hurry? I'm hungry!"

"Can't you get someone else to cook for you?"

"You don't understand, Maka! I need _your _food; it's the best!" Soul said. "Anyway, are you feeling any better? We can always stay another day."

"I feel much better! I can train again today!"

"Don't overwork yourself, Maka." He said, worried.

"I'm _fine, _I promise."

…

Grandmother Evans (who told Maka to call her Granny) and her pupil decided to try working with the dead wavelengths. "If you don't get it, that's fine. It just means you don't have that gift. Your Perception powers are very good even without this."

"Okay." The two women sat in the chairs in the sitting room once more and a crystal ball was placed in the middle of the coffee table between them. "What's that?"

"This is the soul of a dead man that I trapped in this crystal on my last exorcism. He died recently, so his wavelength will be strong enough for you to read."

Dead? Maka was seriously creeped out by the simple way she said this. Death was not a new thing to Maka, of course, but this was the strangest thing she's seen yet. _Including _some pictures of Dr. Stein on Black*Mail, and _not to_ _mention, _those shots of Kid and Soul…oh, Death, how she wished she could erase _those_ from her mind…

"Don't worry; after this I will send his soul to the afterlife."

"Okay…" She felt a tiny bit more reassured after that, but didn't ask any more questions for fear that she might lose the desire to learn how to do this. If she could do it, that is. There were no promises; she could either have the gift or she might not.

"You must use Soul Séance, but focus differently. This time, you must focus on the space around you until you find the dead soul. You will know it when you feel it."

"Soul Séance."

"Yes, that's right. Now listen. There are three souls in this room. Feel yours; very good." She said. "See mine? Yes, that's right. Now look for the third. Do you sense it?"

She felt a tugging at her mind, telling her to look at the crystal in front of her. Focusing with every bit of her strength, she finally felt a faint pulse. "Why is it pulsing? Wavelengths let out a steady hum."

"That is what separates dead and alive wavelengths. Now, when I say go, I want you to count the beats. It'll be for one minute, so keep your concentration. Ready?"

"I'm ready."

"Go." She clicked at an ancient-looking stopwatch set for one minute exactly. "Stop."

"I counted 18 pulses." Maka reported.

"You are a natural! Now we examine these charts." The old woman flipped a large book (Maka felt like they were going to be BFF's) to a table with numbers. "18 is in this grouping, so we can tell that the soul has been dead for a week. The longer it has been dead, the less precise it will be."

"Wow! Who's this book by? Did they teach you how to use Soul Séance?"

The woman took the book back from the girl and closed it gently. "I wrote this book, after I started learning about exorcisms. It contains knowledge about the dead wavelengths, and my observations of Soul Séance on all of my exorcism jobs. It is almost…a diary." She smiled sadly. Maka sensed her solemn moment. "Take it. It will help you."

"I'll take good care of it; I promise." Maka replied, hugging the book to her chest. Another great book to add to her collection! So special, too…this book must not be touched by dust! It will be given a place of honor on her bookshelf.

"I know you will. Now, let's send Mr. Franklin on his way, shall we?" She opened the seemingly crystal ball to allow the dead soul to float into her hands delicately. In a snap, she closed her hands, dissolving the soul. "His wavelengths will return to his body now. You'll read about this process in your book. It's harder than it looks, so promise me when you're ready to, you'll come see me first."

"I will." Maka promised.

…

Meanwhile, Soul had traveled back to kitchen to steal some food for a snack. Picking a box of cookies, he brought his prize to the room designated for watching TV. His brother was already there, watching some (dumb, according to his younger counterpart) documentary.

"So, brother, did anything happen last night that you want to tell me?" He said in a joking tone. "She came out with your clothes on."

Soul, talking with his mouth full, was unable to be understood.

"What?"

"Even if there was, which there wasn't, I wouldn't tell you." He swallowed another cookie as if it were a soul. In fact, he was craving souls at the moment, since all the souls that they've been collecting went to Maka. He pleaded with Death the Kid to let him have _just one, _but Captain Symmetry wanted his new deathscythe ASAP.

"Why not?" Wes wondered. "We're related, after all."

There was a long pause, followed by another cookie to buy him some time. "Maybe it's because I haven't seen you in years? Even when I was still living at home, sometimes I wouldn't see you for months at a time."

"And I'm sorry about that."

"Oh yeah?" Soul said, unbelieving.

"Being on tour as a child isn't a walk in the park. Truth is . . . I was kind of jealous of you." Wes admitted. "I'd have rather stayed home with you."

Soul, still being skeptical, hummed a bland, "hmm?" to ask him to continue.

"When father and I stopped in Austria, in the car I saw two boys playing catch with each other. They reminded me of us. We were about the same ages as we were, at the time. I wanted to go home and be normal."

"But I'm not normal. I'm a Weapon."

"We didn't know that yet." He snapped, not wanting Soul to change the subject, "I wanted us to be brothers."

Soul nodded. "I was jealous of you, too. You're better."

"Maybe in music, I am. But you're special. How many people in the world are Weapons? And what's more, Maka's turned you into a deathscythe." The elder brother reached into Soul's cookies and stuffed one in his mouth. The way he ate it was reminiscent of the way Soul would swallow prekishin souls.

Soul said nothing, but ate another cookie.

"I was worried for you, you know. I could tell that something was wrong with you, by the way you locked yourself in your room whenever you had time." Wes continued. "You messed up one day. I saw you transform your arm before you told me."

"And you didn't say anything?"

"What are you supposed to say? 'I was spying on you and saw you transform your arm into a blade?'"

"I guess."

"How'd you know where to go? I'm just curious."

"I got caught at school. They sent me to the counselor's office. Turns out she was a Weapon, and told me about the academy." Soul answered. "A few days later, I ran away from the house, asked her where it was, and was there by nightfall."

"I wonder if she's still there, that counselor. Maybe you should pay her a visit. I could go with you, if you want."

"I should, shouldn't I? I suppose she's the reason I'm here, now. If you think about it, she might even be the reason the world's still here. If she hadn't told me where Shibusen was, I wouldn't have had the chance to save the world. And I don't even remember her name." Soul mused. "I'll go see if she's there. If Maka asks, tell her I'm going for a ride and I'll be back soon. She'll understand."

"Sure. You going to eat the rest of those cookies?"

…

"Can you at least tell me a bit about what you're doing, Mrs. Evans? I mean . . . it just looked like you clapped your hands together. . ." Maka asked shyly.

"Souls like Mr. Franklin's have some attachment to this world, so powerful that they leave their bodies in search of their mission. Revenge, grief, shock, even… What I am doing is sending these souls back to their bodies where they can die naturally and not wreak havoc." She explained. "And I told you to call me Granny."

"Sorry . . . Granny . . ."

"Oh, dear, don't make a big fuss. You don't _have _to call me that if you don't want to." She looked up at the grandfather clock on the other side of the room. "Well, I'm afraid that's all I have time to teach you now. You'll have to study up on your own. Now, where did Soul get off to?"

"I'm sure he's not far…"

…

"Where the heck were you all day, Soul? I got worried!" Maka yelled as soon as she saw him. They were outside of the house now, saying their goodbye's.

"I was—"

"And you tell Wes to pass along a message that you're _going for a ride? _Your rides don't take up half the day!"

"You don't understand—"

"I was waiting for you!"

"LET ME SPEAK!" He roared. "Sorry. For your information, I went to visit someone, and then ended up helping a new Weapon. I thought you'd be proud at me, not nag."

"You did? Tell me!"

"I'll tell you later."

Hugs were in order. Soul's parents gave their son a group hug, Wes pulled his brother in a half-hug, and Granny held him for a few moments.

"Maka dear! I want to give you something." Granny said after she received a famous Maka hug. Maka gave the rest of the family awkward handshakes but sincere smiles.

"What?"

The older woman placed in Maka's hands the necklace she used for Soul Séance. It was a very significant gift, and Maka gasped. "I can't accept this; it's much too precious to you, and you've given me so much already."

"I want you to have it." She stood up on her tip-toes and draped the beads around Maka's neck. She was nimble for her age, but was still quite short compared to Maka and the others. "Besides, I know I'll see you again." Then, whispering conspiratorially, she added, "maybe in a white dress. Shh. Forget I said that."

"Oh!" It took her a moment. "Um, well, I—"

"Shh." She winked.

"C'mon, Maka, I wanna be home for dinner." The ever-hungry boy said, revving up his motorcycle for emphasis.

"OK! Bye!" Maka tucked the necklace under her shirt for safekeeping and thought about what she might look like in a white dress.

A/n If something doesn't make sense, please ask! I will do my best to elaborate.

~Somehow ended up in Maka's old essay collection~

Tsubaki N.

Class Crescent Moon

March 28th

If Black*Star was born in my family…

…He'd be pretty much the same way he is today. My family is a distinguished line of weapons, and I bet he would have been born a weapon too. My father is very strict, so at first I thought Black*Star would be reserved and respectful like me, but he's Black*Star! I think he would rebel against his elders and be the star that he is today. I just hope that he wouldn't get too carried away.

I bet my brother Masamune (before he went evil) and a young Black*Star would get along. They would probably play together like brothers usually do. Masamune and I played ball together, but if Black*Star was playing it might have gotten out of hand. Well . . . that's what siblings do.

Even though he would be the rebellious one, he would still be raised with warrior's values, just like his assassin rules. He would make a fine weapon if he was born in my family!

… Black*Star did not write his essay …

…In Kid's quest for a perfectly symmetrical essay, he ran out of time and turned in this:

DEATH THE KID

CLASS CRESCENT MOON

MARCH 28TH

IF LIZ AND PATTI WERE BORN IN MY FAMILY…

…

…Liz and Patti were to work together on their assignment, but the paper was mostly done by Liz. Patti didn't have much of an attention span.

Liz _and Patti!_

Class Crescent Moon

March 28th

If Death the Kid was born in our family…

…honestly, he'd probably be dead right now. If he was a Thompson, he wouldn't be a Shinigami so it would be physically possible for him to die. It would be hell living on the streets with an OCD as strong as Kid's. He might be able to purchase two guns to use, but he wouldn't be able to face any potential victims if they weren't symmetrical. Therefore he wouldn't be able to mug anybody.

We were invited to join a gang once. Kid would probably have fared if he had taken up on their offer. They would help him and make sure he got fed.


	7. Chapter 7

Soul Trance!

Chapter 7: Flashback! Fight over daydreams?

"So . . . why don't you tell me about your 'ride'" Maka asked, putting the book she received from Grandmother Evans down. Even a bookworm like her needs a few reading breaks.

"You didn't want to listen to me before." Soul replied sarcastically. "You kept interrupting me."

"I was just worried where you were. Tell me the story!" She begged.

Soul sighed, ready to spill all of the details until she was satisfied. Oh well, this was one of his better stories.

_EPIC SOUL FLASHBACK TIME_

_Soul parked his motorcycle in front of his old school, shaking his helmet hair. This was why he hated wearing helmets; they always damaged his gravity-defying hair. He noticed that some of the kids were outside so it probably was lunch time. Pushing the double-doors open, he welcomed the air conditioning. It was a really hot day. _

_To his slight dismay, the school had gone through some renovations when he was away, but the office he was looking for was still in the same corridor. _

_Ms. R. Volver, the sign read. School counselor. Soul knocked four times, and let himself in, not caring if she had an appointment or not. _

_The woman, dark hair in a proper bun, took off her reading glasses to see who her unexpected visitor was. She recognized him right away. "Solomon Evans, also known as Soul Eater. I wondered if I would ever see you again."_

"_Hi." He said, sitting down across from her. "I'm here to say thanks. Thanks for helping me find Shibusen."_

"_You're very welcome! Almost lost my job, this time. But as it seems, I'm very proud to have met the newest deathscythe."_

"_This time?"_

"_Didn't Shinigami tell you? There are plenty of other things to do for graduates of Shibusen than fighting! Many of us join the teaching or other professions like mine, to find and help young Weapons and Meisters, just like you were. Oh yes, there's Weapons and Meisters in almost any kind of job. Policemen welcome expertly trained meisters, and weapons, gun types, usually. Shibusen needs lawyers to settle disputes, and special doctors to treat weapon injuries. You may have chosen the fighting path, but many of us do not." She explained. "In fact, I was stationed here to find you specifically."_

"_What?" He couldn't take all of this information in. But now that he thought about it, there were other classes at Shibusen that you could take, and not all weapon-meister pairs were as focused on missions and the like. _

"_The Evans family is one of the Great Families of Weapons. It's only natural that Shinigami would be on the lookout for you. It was clear that your brother didn't have the gift, or any of your cousins. I still have your file." She unlocked the bottom drawer of her filing cabinet and dug out the fattest folder, which had his name on it, and his school pictures. It also contained, of course, his report cards. _

"_I don't know what that is." Also, Soul thought, Shinigami was acting like a stalker. "Wouldn't I have known if I was in a family of Weapons?"_

"_That is the sad truth of today. Weapons are so rare nowadays that they've become a legend in some places. Some believe them to be extinct, shall we say. Your mother and father must have believed that was the case. It was also an oddity, and I'm willing to bet your mother wanted you to be normal."_

"_That's bullshit. Except for the last part. You're right about that."_

"_If I was still your school counselor, I'd punish you for language, young man! So, we are forced to work in secret. You can't tell anybody this, you understand? The only one who knows why I'm here is the school board."_

"_Of course."_

"_It's funny that you stop by today; my next appointment is with a girl who I think might be in the same position as you. She's been in fights with the other children, and they said that she had a knife on her, but they never saw her carrying one."_

"_How can you tell if she's a Weapon or just bringing a knife to school?" Soul asked curiously. _

"_You see that box on my doorway? The one that looks like a fire alarm?"_

"_Yeah, so?"_

"_That's some new technology my friend designed, one of the very first models of Weapon detectors. If the girl walks in and is a Weapon, I will see so on my watch."_

"_Why don't they have those at airport security? You don't even want to know how many times-!"_

"_Apparently they'd rather search you. My friend who invented it said that she's tried to sell it to them, but they always refuse for some reason. Anyway, the girl's coming in any minute. Do you want to help me?"_

"_I guess." Soul said, thinking that he'd repay the favor that changed his life. Maybe he'd help change this girl's life too, if she was indeed a Weapon. A knife-type, it sounded like._

"_Wonderful! Sit there in the corner, and if I give you the signal, why don't you transform your fingers or something?"_

_Soul nodded, and sat in the spare chair. An annoyed-sounding knock was at the door._

"_Come in!" Ms. Volver said cheerily. _

_The girl, about twelve years old, had her mouth set in a straight line. It was clear that she didn't want to be here. Her uniform was in slight disarray. She was very much a tomboy. _

"_Hello, Sally Carver. Please, sit down." Soul caught the quick glance at her watch, as if checking the time._

"_Who's he?" Sally replied in a snotty tone. _

"_He's a student teacher. He's sitting in on our visit today." She winked at Soul, who guessed that was the sign, and transformed his middle and index fingers on his right hand and pretended to sharpen them, creating a very soft scraping noise. The action itself was useless of course; Weapons never became dull, even in age._

_Sally saw the blue light of the change, but pretended not to notice. _

"_Do you know why you're here today, Sally?"_

"_I didn't start the fight, I swear!"_

"_I see. That may be true, but those boys said you had a knife with you. Am I right?"_

_Sally looked down at her feet, after a look at Soul, who got rid of the blades as soon as he knew she had spotted them. "You're going to think I'm a freak." Her lower lip wobbled. How uncool, Soul thought, but it was funny how when he was in the same position, he was also called a freak._

"_I would never think that. What is wrong?" Ms. Volver asked nicely. "You can tell me. I won't tell anybody."_

"_A few months ago, you see, I would wake up and my feather pillows would be ripped to shreds! Sometimes my bedding, too . . . I told the servants not to change my sheets so they wouldn't see. Then, one day, I was pulling my hair back, and a lock of hair was chopped off! I looked at my hand, and it had morphed into a knife! It was really scary! But it went away and nobody believed me…"_

"_What happened next?"_

"_Well, Owen and John started making fun of me—they're the school bullies and are really, really mean! They scared me on my way out to the car and knives came out all over my body! One hurt Owen, and I freaked out, and ran away until the knives disappeared. Now they come out whenever I'm angry…"_

"_Do you think you could show me, if you tried? Remember a time when you were angry."_

"_OK…" Sally focused hard, and eventually her hand turned into a kitchen knife. She yelped in surprise. _

"_It's OK, it's OK, and it's uncool to yell." Soul said, leaving his corner. "Calm down. You're safe here. Think about safety now. It'll go away." Different weapons transformed in different ways. One way was reliving moments where you've transformed previously. Perhaps you were feeling angry, and the feeling of defeating your enemy. Another was protection, as if it were a defense mechanism. _

_Calming down and remembering they were safe for a brief moment helped transform back. Soul, however, after all the situations he was in, mostly thought about hugging Maka, because he needed arms for that. _

_The girl did as she was told, and was relieved when the knife disappeared. "How?"_

"_Because we're just like you, Sally. We are Weapons, for lack of a better term. You are a very talented and special girl. There is a school you can go to in order to train your knives, so that they won't hurt anyone. We just need your mother and father's permission." The woman said._

"_I'm not crazy?"_

"_No. And there are many others like you. You're not alone."_

"_Did you go to that school?" Sally asked Soul._

"_Yep, and it's the best place in the world. You should go." The phone in his pocket vibrated. It was a text from Maka, asking where he was. "I've got to go. My meister." He gestured to his phone. "It was nice seeing you again."_

"_Same here." Ms. Volver said._

"_Thank you, Mr…"_

"_I'm Soul Eater, demon scythe."_

…

"That's great! You did your good deed of the day . . . or maybe of the year, since it's you."

"Ha-ha. There was something funny that she said, though. She says the Evans is a family of weapons. Do you know anything about that?"

"No. I don't know what that is. We could check the library." Maka suggested.

"Hmm. Maybe. I'm too lazy to do it now." He kicked his feet up on the coffee table.

"Didn't your Granny say something about it? There was your great-grandfather, and she said that you might find some interesting things in your past." Maka remembered. "I think she knows more than she's told us. It's definitely something interesting to look into."

The oven timer beeped, an annoying sound that rang throughout the apartment. Soul shot up immediately. "Pizza's ready!" He shouted happily. Their pizza was well-earned; on their way back home they picked up a take-and-bake pizza from the local pizza joint, and it was hard for Maka to carry it on the back of the motorcycle. She had perfected the technique a year ago when they realized it was cheaper to bake it themselves than order delivery.

"Remember what Kid said when eating pizza! 8 pieces!" Maka reminded him.

"Oh, I'll try my best." He said sarcastically, taking three slices on his plate. Maka took two. They sat at the dinner table.

"Hey, Soul?" Maka asked. She was thinking about something she noticed. "I was just thinking about something completely random."

"What."

"OK, so, sometimes when I look at you when you're in weapon form you're wearing clothes, but when you look at me I'm . . . I'm . . . not wearing any clothes! Why is that?" 

"You want to see me n—?" He started to joke. 

"NO!" she yelled quickly. "No! Just . . . forget about it."

He chuckled.

…

"Hmm…if he's not in the Lobby, then where is he?" Maka wondered aloud. She was bored, so decided to visit him in his Soul Room that night. "Hey, Soul? Where are you? Soul? Heeellllooo? I know you're in here!"

The visitor scanned through the rest of the Lobby and, finding nothing, ventured to the hallway that led to the other rooms.

"Heeeellllooo?" She searched, peeking her head into doors. Most of them were locked, however, especially the ones with no signs printed on them.

There was a door that scared her, a door that had the kishin's eyes on them. "It's OK, Maka, everyone carries a little bit of madness within them." She reassured herself by repeating an old lesson from Dr. Stein. Still, it really creeped her out and she was becoming more desperate to find the boy this space belonged to.

"Soul? Where are you?"

Maka almost forgot to check Soul's daydream room, but when she saw it she knew that he must be in there. She opened the door exactly how she'd open the door to his bedroom in the morning—not caring what he was doing. This time, however, she cared.

She really should have remembered what she learned in _her _daydream room, the first time she ventured in. Maka froze immediately. Apparently he'd conjured up a clone of her, just like she did with him. Soul was pushing her up against a copy of his piano, kissing her passionately, as her duplicate was doing to him.

It almost felt like he was cheating, just like her Papa, of course, but that was obviously meant to be _her—_

"_Soul," _Maka heard her twin say, "We have a visitor." Yes, that was definitely _her _voice that was speaking, but in this other tone that Maka didn't understand.

"What are you talking about; I didn't call for anybody . . . _shit." _Soul slowly turned around, already knowing who their 'interrupter' was, but wasn't sure exactly what mood she'd be in. Angry, probably, he thought. He could almost feel the lecture.

She wasn't as angry as she was confused. Disgusted, definitely. Maka wasn't _exactly _sure what happened between Soul and the other her, but she had a pretty good idea. "Soul, why?" Was the best thing she could say.

"Same reason you created _him." _Soul glanced to his left, where he summoned Sir Soul. "I'm borrowing him from your daydream room, so you can't deny creating him. I'm not _that _offended by this guy, though. You captured my good side."

Maka couldn't take his cool attitude anymore. "Why are you so calm? You daydream me as a SLUT! Just look at her!"

"That's not true! Is it so wrong to daydream of making out with your girlfriend?" Soul countered.

"Note to Soul, Ido _not _dress like that! That girl is practically naked!"

"Maybe you'll never wear that kind of stuff. Maybe I'm just thinking of what you'd look like with it on." He explained. "It's in my _imagination. _Besides, not everyone can visit other people's dreams like we can—"

"So you want me to look like that and throw myself at you whenever you walk into the room, is that it?" She was in his face now. This was a sign that the fight was getting exponentially larger. Luckily for the both of them, Soul was trying to keep a level head. Getting angry wasn't cool at all.

"MAKA! This is a daydream room, not reality. Think about daydream-Soul. You're just wishing I was more like him. But," He paused, "_I'm _not like that."

"What are you implying?" She glared.

"I'm implying that we . . . what's the phrase . . . agree to disagree, that's right. You wish I was more courteous and I wish you were flirtier. Let's just accept it and forget about it."

Maka gave a deep sigh and glanced at the two doppelgangers talking to each other. Make-out Maka was trying to flirt with Sir Soul, and it seemed to be working, because after a few words they were now kissing. Reality Soul noticed this too.

"This is really awkward. I feel like we're intruding, but that's us. . ." Maka said. "I should take _him _home. Sir Soul!"

Make-out Maka pouted as he left to leave with Maka.

"I'm not going to follow you everywhere you go either, Maka." Soul said.

"But . . . you'll follow me most places, right?"

Soul nodded. "I'll always be a step behind you."

And, as an afterthought, Maka added shyly, "But Soul?" 

"What?"

"What you called me, your girlfriend . . . is that what I am?"

"I thought you were. I mean, you said you liked me, I said I liked you…I only figured…"

"What do I do?"

"I dunno. Hold hands and go on dates and shit. Stupid stuff like that."

"Tomorrow, I'll let you hold my hand."

…

~On Maka's desk, bookmarks galore~

Observations of the Soul Exorcist, by Georgia Evans

July 12th

Today I was called to exorcise a theater that had reports of missing props, eerie voices, and broken equipment. My first impression was that of a previous case that my mentor took me on, of a dead actor who was upset that he died before his debut. The theater had closed down ever since the events started, which was a huge tip-off.

First I set up my equipment in the middle of the stage. I brought with me a blanket to sit on, eight scented candles, and a crystal ball to trap the soul if it became malevolent. I didn't foresee that happening, but it was always good to prepare for the worst.

My materials set, it was time to perform the exorcism. I ran a hand over the diamond in the middle of my jewel necklace for comfort and closed my eyes.

"Soul Séance." I said out of habit and also for show. Something that I had inherited from my teacher was his love for drama. This job reminded me greatly of him, and it was hard to focus my gift at first. Would I find another who shared our special gift? I thought about visiting that school, that academy that he often spoke of. But…what would I find there? The academy was for weapons and meisters, not fortune tellers and exorcists like me. I feel…somewhat alone.

But I was on a job, and I must finish my duties as an exorcist. First I felt my soul appear and grow. I noted the three people who sat around me as to not get confused. Blocking them out of my sixth sense, I listened closely for a pulsing, dead wavelength.

It was coming from the rooms where the spotlights reside, a tough place to get to, but I was in good enough shape to climb the wooden ladder. The soul was resisting my presence, I could tell, so I chanted the mantra to hold a spirit so I could store it in the crystal ball.

This was the height of my powers, my mentor said to me, that I was still young enough to capture a spirit without assistance. My employers said that they felt a shiver as I captured the spirit, which was understandable. They too were actors, and could have felt the same pain that the soul in my hand had felt. I didn't know exactly what that was, not yet.

The dead soul traveled into the crystal ball as I read it. "He didn't get the part he wanted, before he died." I revealed. What a conceited person, I thought.

I talked to my employers as if I were a stereotypical fortune teller. Once satisfied that they had "forgiven" the dead, I brought the soul back out from its prison and closed on it. Every exorcism has a different feel to it, and takes a toll on the mind. It was all practice. Practice, practice, practice.

A/n I love writing epic Soul flashbacks. Did you get their names? Ms. R. Volver was a Revolver? Sally Carver was a carving knife? I thought I was being clever…


	8. Chapter 8

Soul Trance!

Chapter 8: Hurray! Fluff awaits?

Now that Maka thought about it, they've held hands plenty of times before this. They grabbed each other's hands before Soul transformed. It would only be for a second, sure, but by now it would be hundreds of times. So why was she feeling so nervous now? Maybe she should have kept the gloves; her palms were so sweaty.

She analyzed it further. The fingers that weaved through hers were soft and smooth, almost elegant. She supposed he got that from all the piano playing. His hands were so much bigger than hers—it was almost scary. But like him, the way he held her hand was protective, borderline possessive. Maka forced her tiny hand to stay put.

Would she ever get used to walking with a hand trapped in someone else's?

She wondered how deeply she'd analyze her first kiss. First _real _kiss, that is. She didn't count those other times where they were going through that stupid thing called Weapon's Loyalty. Weapon's Love. How appropriate, now. Weapons in love!

Their quick walk to Stein's office seemed so long for Maka, who was too busy scrutinizing how it felt to walk holding Soul's hand. He gave her quick smirks of reassurance as they went. Maka knew he knew she was feeling insecure about all this, and in an attempt to tell him that she wasn't, she squeezed his hand tightly for a few seconds.

Soul sighed now, knowing Maka was torturing herself just to make him happy. He felt a little selfish, but maybe she'll eventually actually _want _to hold his hand? He could only hope.

The moment they stepped in front of the door, Maka dropped his hand.

"You wanted to see us, professor?" Maka asked. They were called out of class because Dr. Stein wanted to talk to them about something.

"Ah, yes, Soul and Maka. Sit down." Maka noted that the lights were all on in the office / lab / cave. Was it due to Marie's influence? The weapon-meister pair sat down in two plastic chairs that Stein had left out for them. They were covered in his trademark patchwork design.

"Is this about our trip? Did Kid tell you about the Soul Séance?"

"Yeah, Stein, why'd ya call us so early?" Soul yawned.

"I want to clarify something that I talked to you about. I told you once that you were not to visit each other's Soul Rooms too often. But, by your reports, Maka, it seems like you are going more than I would think is safe."

"But Doctor Stein, you told me yourself that you wanted to know more about the Soul Rooms…" Maka said, disappointed.

"Yes . . . I do want to learn more. . ." He giggled madly. "But I digress. As much as I love dissecting things—I mean learning things—I worry about my students."

"Thanks for your concern, Stein, but I think Maka and I will be just fine—" Soul started to say, standing up. The lab kind of creeped him out. But he wasn't about to admit to being afraid and therefore being uncool.

"Sit. Soul, you might be the meister in this situation, but you are still enrolled in my class and I insist you listen to what I have to say about you and your weapon's safety." Soul frowned and sat back down. He noticed how easily the teacher was able to refer to him as a meister, whereas it was only now, almost a year after their mission that he always called himself Maka's meister. Maka was also totally OK with this now as well. "I was researching the Soul Rooms and want to tell you what might happen if you visit too much."

"Why?" Maka worried.

"If you wake up with another soul in yours, both souls will be stuck in one body. The body without a soul will die. The body with two souls will have its nervous system overloaded."

"Enough with the fancy talk." Soul said. "Can you put it in normal-speak?"

"Put it this way: don't go too often and don't go for long periods of time or there _will_ be consequences."

…

"Well, I'm beat. Wanna watch a movie?" Soul said when they got home.

"Sure. It's my turn to pick though."

Soul groaned; Maka always chose dumb romantic comedies that made him gag.

…

"What'cha reading, Maka?" Despite their warnings, Soul got bored, so he decided to pester Maka in her Soul Room.

"Oh, just some book I've been meaning to finish."

Soul plopped himself down on the second armchair. Then, seeing as Maka was still reading and probably wouldn't entertain him, he decided to do something most unlike him. "I'm going to read something too."

He started to reach for a manga that looked out-of-place among the textbooks. "No, don't!" Maka yelled, and amended, "Please don't."

"Why not? I've let you touch my piano." That was on another trip, before Stein had given any warnings at all.

Maka remembered what it felt like when she touched the keys of his prized Conduit. It felt happy, almost alive. She couldn't describe it, but it felt like _him_ somehow.

"But you won't let me touch your books." Soul said. "Ironic, since you're usually begging me to read."

"I'm afraid." She said after a while. "When I touched your piano it felt like all of your soul was pouring into me. I just don't know…do you really want to?"

She looked back up at Soul's so-called 'patient face', an expression he didn't show very often, and decided that she was strong, she was brave. She had the courage to fight fear, and she would let him in.

"All right, then. Pick something!"

"Maka—you don't have to—"

"I do have to."

Soul didn't seem to believe her, but he was happy. He closed his eyes, picking a random book. It happened to be a Dr. Seuss book, so he picked the next one, a textbook about Advanced Soul Studies. Taking it off of the shelf, he felt a burst of intense joy, followed by a glimpse of fear. Maka watched as he opened the book, finding it not to contain information, but what could only be called "Understanding Maka for Dummies."

He read. And read. And read some more. He seemed to have been there for hours on end, even though a day could pass and only a second would go by in the real world. Soul chuckled, cried, and made all sorts of faces.

"Soul?"

"Huh…what?" He snapped out of his trance, an action strangely like when Maka would be interrupted while reading, especially during a good part of the book.

"I feel really happy right now." Maka said shyly.

Soul stood up and put the book approximately where he found it. "I should get back now," he explained, "it feels like I've been here for hours, and I don't know when I'm going to wake up."

"I was just waiting for you to finish reading, but you wouldn't stop."

"Idiot." Soul said back, and as an afterthought, clutched at one of Maka's hands to bring her closer. Empowered from his study of "Maka for Dummies" he cupped his partner's cheek and pressed a confident pair of lips to hers.

He gave her one opportunity to flee, if that was what she wanted. Forcing himself wasn't cool, of course, but at Maka's romantic pace, they'd probably never kiss, and dying alone was even MORE uncool. He let the hand he'd pulled around her waist go, in case she didn't want it there. To his surprise, she stayed, and even came closer. He paused, possibly in shock.

"Stop smirking!" Maka complained. "You're laughing at me."

"Well, you need to stop talking." He growled.

"Kiss me again or I'll throw all of my books at your head." She ordered.

"Gladly."

Maka couldn't help but over-analyze everything. She couldn't believe how _right _this felt, allowing him to touch her soul like that, and for her to let go of all of her doubt and lack of faith in men. _He's the only one for me, _she knew. _It's so gentle, yet so . . . confirming. He's confirming that this is OK. _ And it _was _OK; in fact it was so _perfect _the way he made her feel…

No feelings barred. She wrapped her arms around his torso. It was impossible to hide anything down here, deep within her soul, anyway. She gasped as she allowed his tongue to enter her mouth. His eyes got a mischievous sparkle when she flicked her tongue timidly against his. Pleased at her boldness, Soul grumbled deep in his chest and Maka could help but moan a little when his hands moved a little lower down her back and eventually took hold of her hips…

"Ahem." Two voices interrupted. Maka and Soul sprung apart.

"Sir Soul?" Maka exclaimed at the same time as Soul said, "Make-out Maka?"

"_That's _what you call her?" Maka hissed. Soul laughed guiltily, sweat drop beading down his forehead. "What are you guys doing here? You shouldn't be outside your daydream rooms!"

"That's _exactly _why we're here. We hate being locked up all the time! We want full access to your minds . . . and therefore your bodies as well. I'd _love _it _so much, _if you get my meaning, Soul." Make-out Maka said, running her fingers up and down his arm.

"And we'd rather not have to deal with _this, _Maka, my love." He lifted his right hand, showing it to the pair. It was a woman's hand, specifically Maka's hand, when you noticed the tiny mole on the back. "As much as I love you, I'd rather not have your hand."

"How—"

"Every time you visit each other's rooms your souls overlap, and, consequently, your soul rooms as well. They're currently so close, we were able to cross over without even travelling through the tunnel."

"What are you going to do with us?" Soul demanded to know.

"We were talking to each other, and we figured if we lock you in here, and take over your bodies, since our dreamed-up entities can't use Resonance or Equilibrium, we won't have to worry about anything."

"Our souls are already connected; you can't change that." Soul spat. "And get _off'a _me!" He pushed the flirtatious girl away from him.

Make-out Maka, clearly offended, suddenly had copy of Soul's deathscythe form in her hands. Sir Soul now had a copy of Maka's form. The two clones used their scythes to corner Maka and Soul, and pushed them towards Maka's daydream room.

"Soul! They're only daydreams! Just imagine that they don't exist!" Maka said, thinking really, really hard. They weren't disappearing!

Make-Out Maka laughed. "I'm _you, _silly! Soul imagined me to be _you! _Therefore this place also belongs to me! And while I'm here, _he _stays! Oh, and by the way, be thankful we're not sticking you in the Madness." She locked the door.

…

_~The History of Weapons, aisle five in the Shibusen Library~_

"SOOOOOUUUULLLL!"

Said boy was lounging in the living room, watching TV. He perked up at the sound of his name. "Maaakkkaaa." He mocked.

"Were you trying to copy off my essay again?" She accused.

"No." Soul said. "Why do you say that?"

"A hair." She said, holding up a seemingly invisible piece of proof. "I found this on my essay. Now tell me, who do I know that has white hair? That's right, you."

Soul, knowing he was caught, looked away, and did not notice the heavy object dropped on his lap. "Maka! What the hell! That hurt! You could have just _given _me the book!"

"We're supposed to read the prologue by tomorrow. Read." Maka ordered.

Prologue:

In the beginning, there existed Shinigami and his Eight Great Warriors. Together they kept the peace and maintained the balance in this world with their weapon partners at hand. The partners were regular weapons, really, but enriched with magical power. They possessed a human-like soul wavelength, and could, during resonance, speak telepathically to their partner. It was this that made the Warriors so strong.

One Warrior, named Asura, became afraid of his weapon partner. He was so afraid that he broke the ancient law to only hunt evil souls. As he fed his weapon human souls, they grew more powerful, but eventually went insane. It released madness to the world, and Asura, the first Kishin, was born.

A war was fought against the Kishin, but he overpowered the other Great Warriors, and it was only Shinigami's brilliance to use Asura's weakness of covering his skin to trap him under his school. He bound his soul to Death City, and hoped it would be enough to keep him imprisoned.

Unfortunately, as he did this, he did not realize that the Seven Great Weapons (as Asura's had been eaten) had gone missing.

In the 1200's, a witch named Arachne was beginning experiments. She had collected from around the world the missing weapons, curious about how they could speak, and when she found they would not speak to anyone who they weren't bonded with she decided to allow them to speak for themselves.

Arachne killed seven of her own kind, giving her name of the heretic witch, and by infusing the Great Weapons with more magic, gave them the power to transform from human to weapon and back again. Their power would be passed on to their children, she said, it had mutated their soul's wavelength. With modern science we now know that the witch's doings had actually mutated their DNA. We will address this in more detail in chapter nine.

She named the seven "demon weapons" and ordered them to fight by her side. They refused, and ran away from the witch's house.

The witch was furious. In retaliation, she went back to the drawing board on her experiments with demon weapons. This time, she decided to use regular weapons, and adjusted her magic so that she would only have to kill one more witch.

Things didn't go according to plan. The one she found was in fact not a witch, but a cat with a lot of magical power. Her experiment failed, but the cat's fur had caught some of the potion, and as she left, people would breathe in the cat hair and receive the mutated Weapon Gene.

It was slow at first for those weapons to appear, but soon, along with the seven families, all different types. As the Gene spread across the world, new types of weapons were born. These would usually match the types of normal weapons that were used in that area. As time went on, guns evolved, and Shinigami was forced to make his school, Shibusen, even larger by setting up other branches. We'll go into more detail about Shibusen in chapter fourteen.

In the 1500's, the new weapons had outnumbered the Seven Families'. In this book, we will look at the history of each family and the history of the weapon academy that changed everything.

A/n I love making history up! Aka please don't flame me if I messed it up. I'm just having fun. Also, LOL it's not only Soul and Maka who mistake a magical cat for a witch!


	9. Chapter 9

Soul Trance!

Chapter 9: Let's play dress up! Possibly the weirdest thing you've ever seen?

"OW!" Maka complained as she was tossed ungracefully into her Daydream Room. Soul fell in a moment afterwards.

"Couldn't you have imagined a carpeted room?" Soul said, trying to lighten the mood.

She didn't respond, but instead banged on the door. The door was rapidly cloned in various shapes and sizes scattered about the room. Maka tugged at the doorknobs of each one desperately. Keys piled up on the floor.

"HELP ME!" Maka yelled at the boy, who was sitting on the replica of their living room couch, chin on his fist in thought.

"We can't get out. He lives here, so he has the key."

"Who, Sir Soul?" Maka asked.

"Yeah. Who's he supposed to be, anyway? A less cool version of me?"

"He's supposed to be you, but charming, and eloquent, like a prince. Which gives me an idea . . . this is _my _imagination we're in, after all. . ." She laughed evilly and creeped forward.

"No! There's no way in hell that I'm going to act like—" Soul protested, figuring out Maka's plan. Sir Soul was _supposed _to be a version of _him, _after all . . . She probably figured if he was like his alter ego, he'd be able to open the door. Soul scurried as fast as he could away from Maka and hid behind the TV. When he got there, he tripped over his new, imagined metal boots.

"Let me see!"

"This is _so _uncool…" He grumbled, coming out of his hiding place, scowling. However, he was astonished to see not a laughing hysterically Maka, but a prettied-up version with hearts coming out of her eyes. He felt a flutter in his chest like he always did when he saw her in a dress. Soul smiled—dear Shinigami the apocalypse was coming!—softly, almost tenderly. Almost. Guess the world wasn't going to blow up after all.

"Say it." Maka ordered sweetly. "Please!"

His good mood vanished when he realized what she wanted to hear. Deep breath before officially losing cool, check. Rolling of the eyes, check. "My dear, beautiful, lovely princess Maka, um, how do you fair this fine summer evening?" he guessed, offering a hand to be held.

The princess giggled and blushed.

"Oh how I love you, Maka." He said stiffly. "Let me open this door for you."

"Why thank you!"

Click! The door was opened. Soul was relieved to see that he was back in his normal leather jacket attire and Maka back into her school uniform. The female, when picturing her body, always saw herself wearing her red skirt and green tie. It wasn't like she didn't _like _her green tank top or the black dress she donned in Soul's Soul Room, it was just that she thought the uniform represented _her. _The blouse signified her being a faithful student; the trench and boots showing how powerful and kick-ass she could be.

"I am not doing that again." Soul let her know.

Maka huffed, "I expect _getting out of my soul _wasn't a good enough reason?"

Instead of answering her question, where the answer was obvious, yes, it was a good enough reason, he changed the subject. "Where do we go?"

"I guess we could try other rooms and see if we find anything useful…but there's so many! I think there might be more rooms than the last time I was here!" Maka suggested in despair.

"Hey, do you hear that?"

"Hear what?" Maka listened hard, and finally caught the noise Soul was talking about. It was a deep rumbling—coming their way! It changed into the sound of an avalanche. It grew louder and louder, and the two weapon-meisters held on to each other, looking around for the source.

"Look! Doors!" Suddenly, each door was copied…almost. Where Maka's doors were neat and proper, these new doors were mismatched and reminded Soul of that collection of antique and new guitars he saw at the music store. Some were made of fine wood, like an acoustic guitar, and others were flashy like a rock star's. They were also familiar—they were his!

"Maka, those are mine!" He exclaimed.

"Remember what Professor Stein said? Right now, there are two souls in one body. Your rooms must have followed behind you when you came in to visit me! And look at this—the door I go through to find yours is meshed with mine."

Soul touched the door that Maka spoke of. "No. Stein's wrong about this one. Remember what Granny said? Our souls were overlapping! They must have been doing that once we started using the Soul Equilibrium! And now it's complete!"

"So you _were _listening?" She mocked. "You sounded pretty smart just then."

"Shut up. It's to save our skins." Sometimes, Soul hated when Maka automatically assumed he was dumb just because he cheated on a test, _once. _Homework was uncool, but being stupid definitely wasn't. For example, in Soul Studies, Soul usually got scores in the A range, because he couldn't help but pay attention in a class because he'd perk up every time someone said "soul".

He was perfectly fine with the obvious fact that his partner was smarter than him though.

"I think you're right. We better find out more about this place. Let's try going into some of the other doors." Maka suggested.

"OK. I'm going to try the first door I see. Let's go in that one." It was one of Maka's doors, a morbid black compared to most of the other doors, which were a crisp white. Inside they were looking down at a cathedral that looked very familiar to Soul, though he couldn't quite remember it. Did they fight there, once? Geez, all those missions blended together…

Maka's face fell. Was this one of the battles they'd lost? Obviously Maka remembered it…well, this was one of her rooms after all.

"The doors…the doors only open one way, they open inward." Chrona's insane voice spoke.

"Fight back, Maka!"

"But if I do you'll die!"

"I am your weapon partner, Maka. That means I am always prepared to die for my meister."

Oh. Soul remembered this battle now.

_I can't lose you. I can't lose you. I can't let you die…_Maka's voice rang from speakers overhead. _I'm afraid of losing you._

He jumped out to protect her and Maka screamed. A jarring jump cut and the scene replayed itself, like one of those silly GIF images that Soul saw online.

Some funky room this was. It wasn't exactly the Memory Theater…they were looking down upon it, giving him a sense of vertigo. Where were they? His partner's face was in horror.

_This must be the Fear room, _Soul thought, _so before Maka goes all emo again I need to get her out of here. _

He pushed her out the door, saying, "Maybe you should pick the next one."

"What about that one?" She suggested after she calmed down.

"DON'T GO IN THAT ONE! Let's just move on to the next one…" Soul not-so-subtly stood in front of this apparently terrible door, which looked just like all of the other ones if you didn't notice the stickers that decorated it. He recognized it; he'd been there before.

"OK." Maka said, to his relief. As they were about to check the next one, she ran back to open the door. She could sure be sneaky when she wanted to!

"NOOOoooo!" Soul ran back in so much terror, it felt like he was going in slow motion. He heard his voice coming out from inside the room, a version that reminded him of his voice as a little kid. It was so uncool when you compare it to his post-puberty voice. He could have done without the year of voice cracking that he endured. Oh, puberty…

Inside this room everything was either pink or covered with lace. A young girl's bedroom, Maka thought. She could see the back of a little white-haired girl, who sat with her stuffed animals around a small, plastic table. On the table's pink tablecloth were a plastic tea set and a small plate of chocolate chip cookies. She poured fake tea for the bear with a paper crown attached to its head with scotch tape. "Princess Molly, would you care for some more tea?"

"_Oh, yes, Soul, I would love another cup of tea!" _The girl made a fake voice for the bear and moved on to the Barbie doll.

"Oh! Princess Daisy! You got crumbs all over your dress! I'll go pick out a new one for you! Should you wear the pink one with the buttons or the yellow one with the flowers?"

"_What about the blue one with the sequins, Soul?"_

"Good idea, Princess Daisy, that one matches your eyes! I'd better go get it!" The girl left her seat to rummage through a box full of doll clothes. As she turned around to go back to the table, Maka saw her red eyes and smiling sharp teeth. "Tea parties are so much fun!" Soul (?) giggled.

On closer inspection, the child in the room wasn't a girl in the first place. It was a little boy that stood there giggling. The teeth gave away his identity and the dress made it really, really creepy.

Another child walked into the room. It was Maka! She wore a pink dress, almost camouflaging her in the room.

"Oh, hi Maka! Are you here to join the tea party?"

"Yes!"

"But Maka, you can't go to the tea party dressed like that! We have to get you dressed up!" The little Soul put strands of plastic beads around Maka's neck and gave her a paper crown to wear that matched his. "Look Maka, we match!"

"They're really pretty, Soul!"

"OK, Princess Maka, you can sit next to Princess Molly. Maka, would you like a chocolate chip cookie?" The two children giggled and pretended to drink tea.

Maka closed the door slowly, horrified. "Soul. What. The. Fuck. Was. That?" It wasn't often when Maka dropped the F-bomb, but in this situation, it seemed appropriate.

"That…is the room that contains my feminine side…we guys lock them up but sometimes they get out…" He remembered the last time his girly side appeared, when he was deciding on what color headband would look best with his leather jacket and orange shirt. At least nobody saw that one…

She couldn't help but laugh and open the door again. This time, the bedroom looked like a pastel version of his room at their apartment. Posters of boy bands covered the walls where jazz bands lived in real life. Now Soul was about thirteen, looking at girly magazines with Maka and gossiping, complete with excessive use of the word "like".

"You have _got _to hear what Black*Star said to me today. He said he has a crush on, like, _Tsubaki! _O-M-G can you, like, _believe _that?" Soul picked out a color of nail polish. It matched the camisole and pajama pants that he wore, reminiscent of a set that Maka owned in real life. In fact, the equally gossipy Maka wore the same outfit but in a different color.

"Oh _puh-_lease. _Everyone _knows _that." _Maka responded.

Soul brushed it off. "Hey, look at this, Maka! We have _got _to try this new product. It's supposed to, like, exfoliate our skin."

"Oh, and look at this! It's a test to see, like, if your crush likes you back! We have _got _to try it! Hmm…O-M-G he totally likes me!"

"L-O-L! _No way_! O-M-G my crush likes me back too!" The two teenagers squealed together. "This is totally awesome!"

Maka snorted and closed the door again.

"Don't laugh at me; you're playing race cars and pushing other kids off the play structure. You're a bully as a boy! And . . . Cheetoes. . ."

"What the hell, Eater, you're cheating." A masculine Maka punched Soul in the shoulder. They were playing video games in a very messy version of their apartment. Dirty dishes and other debris littered the floor, and Soul reached into a bag of Cheetoes. Maka too had fake cheese on her face. She didn't normally eat Cheetoes, but when she did she always used a napkin.

"Am not. I'm just better than you."

Maka threw down her controller in anger and started to leave the living room.

"Are you going to go _read _again? You're such a loser."

"Screw you." Maka said. "Go play with your My Little Ponies." Her laugh almost sounded like Black*Star's. That was pretty scary.

"It's called being a Brony, Maka, and it's totally cool. It's at least 20% cooler than you."

"Huh?"

"Maka, even when you're acting like a guy you're a loser." Soul informed her. "Don't even know what a Brony is. How uncool."

"Let's just move on, OK?"

"OK."

"Let's go…" She did _not _want to see Soul in a dress again anytime soon, much less a freaking camisole. How creepy! It showed off his chest in all the wrong ways, if that were possible. "We need to stop wasting time! We have to pick a room that might help us somehow!"

…

"Did you hear that?" A foreign, deep voice was at the end of the hallway! Where did he come from?

"No." A second voice said. "We're here to guard, not listen for dust to fall."

"No, seriously!" The first guard insisted.

Soul took action and pulled them into the closest room, one of Maka's, that read DENIAL.

A jail cell. They were in a dungeon. "Why'd you lock yourself up?" Soul asked when he saw the prisoner. "Ya can't really deny your existence. And what's with all the mirrors?"

"Don't you see it?" Maka stared into the eyes of the locked-up Maka until tears came to her eyes and she fell to the floor, knees weak. "Don't you see how different we are?"

"Uh . . . one of you is crying and the other one isn't? I don't get it. You look exactly the same." He scratched his head in confusion. His eyes flashed from each version, trying to find difference, but he came up with nothing. Instead, he noticed a key hanging from the wall. The metal of the key matched the metal of the lock on the cage, so he figured they went together. "Why don't we let her out?" His fingertip touched the key, and he received a shock of pain. It was hot to the touch! He couldn't pick it up even if he tried.

"But she's so beautiful…we're nothing alike." She stood, hands holding the bars of the prison in despair. The mirrors that lined the walls of the cell and the ones behind her reflected so that you could see every angle of her body. Maka just kept staring at her clone; she felt like she couldn't take her eyes off her. It was also a little strange to have yourself look back at you.

Soul walked up to Maka and put his hand on her shoulder. He finally understood that Maka was denying her beauty. He's heard her say multiple times that she'd, "never be beautiful!" It was probably his fault…

"You're exactly alike. Play the mirror game." Soul lifted Maka's arm, since she was apparently too mesmerized by her own reflection to move, and the clone moved her arm to mimic Maka's, whether it was up, down, or sideways. "She does exactly what you do."

"We _are _the same, aren't we?"

"Now get that key and let her free." Soul bet she was the only one who could touch the key. Speaking of, it was already in her hand. She fit the key in the lock and opened the door. The mirrored Maka disappeared.

Soul pulled Maka in for a hug, pressing her crying face against his chest. It took a lot to realize you were denying something about yourself. Maka knew that she couldn't have done it without Soul, which was odd, because his constant teasing was the start of it. "Shh…it's OK…" He wasn't used to trying to comfort someone. Neither was his coat; it was now stained with tears and had wrinkles where Maka clung to it.

"Thank you." She pulled away.

"Don't let it get to your head, though. That would be so uncool…" Soul didn't want her to become one of those stupid girls who were obsessed with themselves.

"I won't."

…

_From the book Great Weapon Families, the chapter about bladed weapons_

One such family is the Evans family. They share a common characteristic of having a red and black pattern on their weapon forms, known as the Evans Coloring. As humans, men in the family are white haired and red eyed, but any member, male or female, that has the weapon gene has sharp teeth.

They are descendants of the fourth of the Seven Families of Weapons, giving them a scythe-type weapon form. They are often considered the most beautiful of the weapon forms, because all are highly ornamented and often shine of gold.

However, because their weapon gene is recessive, there are less and less scythes born. This is different from the Natkatsuka family, where every child is born a weapon.

After the imprisonment of Asura, the first of the Eight Great Warriors, the Evans family was given royalty status and took possession of some land in England. They owned many estates throughout Europe and enjoyed the good life.

The family did not follow the path of having every weapon of the family fight with Shinigami. It was their tradition to send only one child a generation to train. They would choose the child based on their personality but would often choose a male heir over a female one, even if he was timid.

Children not chosen were gifted in the musical arts, so they were also known for their musical achievements as well as their powerful weaponry. As the amount of scythes born declined, it appeared like the Fourth Great Family had finally disappeared and had been replaced with music.

-The great comeback of the Evans family-

After generations of no scythes, Peter Evans was born with the gene. It seemed like the potency of the blood had grown in the time of its last presence, and it was clear that the boy would be powerful. He entered the Shibusen Europe Branch at the age of thirteen and graduated with full honors. His meister partner, Tina, fulfilled her mission of turning Peter into a deathscythe after three years of training. The two got married soon after, and began their career Kishin hunting in the streets of London. He was known among the villains as the "white haired reaper" and was greatly respected among the other Kishin hunters.

On their last mission before they would retire, the deathscythe, probably because of his fight with the witch, lost his weapon form completely. He drove himself into madness, mourning his abilities, and played out his sorrow on a dark piano tucked in a hidden room of the Evans Manor. After he died, a music score was found hidden in the piano bench.

At the end, scribbled at the bottom were some strange words that no one seemed to fully understand. "The next scythe . . . my inheritance . . . finds comfort in the black and white keys . . . green eyes . . . when he is ready, green eyes . . . black keys, black blood, the Evans Curse . . . bright, green eyes . . . an eater of souls to fight the madness . . . a warrior to conquer the past" Historians believe that the message was written during the last moments of his insanity, and that he may have seen a vision of a future Evans child to have the Weapon Gene, but this seems highly unlikely.

~O~

"Maka! Maka! Look at this; it's me!" Soul rushed into his partner's room, where she was sitting calmly at her desk.

"What?" She looked up from her homework. "Soul, are you getting excited over a _book?" _

"No!" He denied. "Read this. I finally found something on my family."

The bookworm read the passage with interest, pouring over the last thing Soul's great-grandfather had written. "Yeah, you're right! The green eyes he predicted must have been me."

"I found the hidden piano once." Soul said. "I was playing hide-and-seek with Wes and my cousins when we visited the Evans manor back in England. I tried to find it again, to show Wes, but the room disappeared."

…

A/n the tea party was inspired by the lust chapter of the manga, even though the series is anime based. Picture the young Maka in the pink dress when she entered Chrona's soul laughing with a chibi Soul wearing a dress. Umm… O_o

Actually I was just watching Toddlers and Tiaras with my fingers on the computer. I seriously wasn't even looking at what I was writing till I looked down and was like WTF? …IT'S PERFECT! Now, if I got little girly Soul into a sparkly dress, he would _definitely _win Supreme Queen of cutest thing to come out of my brain EVER!

Just to clarify, in the masculine / feminine room your body doesn't gender-bend, only your mind. It started out as a gender-bender but when I was editing I realized that it didn't make much sense to what the room was supposed to accomplish so I switched it.

Go to and type in Brony if you don't already know what that is. (Shame on you if you don't! Just kidding…it's OK.) My brother and I just got into it. Hmm…if Maka was a My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, she would be Twilight Sparkle. Soul would be Rainbow Dash. Definitely.


	10. Chapter 10

Soul Trance!

Chapter 10: Don't say a word! How do you battle a daydream?

"So, who're those guys?" Soul asked. He stuck his head out of the room they were currently in, hoping the two guards were gone, but they were still on duty.

"I don't know, but I have an idea. Don't say a word." She emphasized.

It was a good thing she could alter her own avatar wherever she was! She pictured herself wearing the skimpy lingerie set that Make-Out Maka wore, complete with high heels.

Soul's mouth dropped to the floor and Maka swore his eyes turned into giant hearts. He was about to say something, but Maka held his mouth shut with her hand. "Not a word." He frowned childishly as Maka stumbled in her heels to the two guards, rubbing the blood from Soul's nose on her leg.

"Excuse me, I'm lost! I forgot where I have to go to carry out my plan…can you help me?" Maka batted her eyelashes.

"Well…" One of them said.

Around the corner, Soul was miming pouty lips and sticking out his chest. When Maka gave him a look of disgust, he flashed a smile. She did as he suggested to the second guard, fluttering her lashes again. "Please help me~!"

Her amateur attempt at seduction seemed to be working! The man blushed, spilling out his words, "You have to go that way, and then turn left at the third intersection. It's the room with the double doors."

"Thank you~!"

Maka wobbled back over to where the still-bleeding Soul was hiding. How shameless! There was now a puddle of red liquid. It was a wonder Soul was still alive—oh, wait, this wasn't his body, it was just his avatar. "Do it again!" He pleaded.

"No."

Maka changed back into her normal outfit. Soul looked like he was about to cry. She sighed, and thought again. Unbuttoning a few buttons on her blouse, she showed Soul that she was wearing the underwear he imagined. "You happy?"

"_YES!"_

She half-dragged the happy boy, who was even happier she was holding his hand. In fact, he almost looked high. Thankfully, putting her clothes back on stopped his atrocious nosebleed. Soul was pretty sure if he asked _really, really nicely, _she might bare 95% of her skin again. Hmm…one day down the road he might see 100%...he could only hope.

"Quit it, Soul, you look like Kid whenever he sees something perfectly symmetrical."

"I do?"

"No, of course not, stupid. I just wanted you to stop drooling. So stop." She gave him the evil eye, which worked right away. "This is it." The two stood in front of a double door, one side being the neat and tidy Maka style door and the other a more random look like Soul's doors. "I can feel something vibrating in there."

"Yeah, I can feel it through my feet." Soul agreed. "What d'you think it is?"

Maka placed a tentative palm on the double door. The two sides felt different somehow. She concentrated hard and exclaimed, "Soul, check it out! Your side feels like your soul's wavelength, and my wavelength is on my side. This must be where soul wavelengths are made! Then they're released through the Conduits… The double doors make sense; they're all meshed together if you touch the center where the doors meet."

Soul pushed the doors open saloon-style, as if they were in a western movie and he was the sheriff. Inside they saw a huge machine in a place that looked like a car garage.

"It looks like the engine of my motorcycle." Soul observed. "Sounds like it too."

"One side looks different than the other. It's slight, but they look like they were made of different kind of metals." Suddenly, steam came out of the strange contraption, one side a bright orange and one side a light blue.

"Look over here, Maka! I found a toolbox and some cords." Soul was off exploring the garage. Maka trotted over to where Soul was. The toolbox seemed pretty normal. It contained different sizes of wrenches, screwdrivers and a variety of other little things.

The cords, on the other hand, were a different story. Each was wrapped in a different color and had labels printed on them. The green one was labeled "Soul Resonance" and the purple one, which was thicker, read "Friendship". Like a battery, each end was marked. One end had an "M" on it and the other a "S." They guessed that meant that one side was supposed to go on Maka's side and the other on Soul's side.

There were lots of others, including a red one with an odd device sticking out of the middle. It had an on and off switch. Soul put it at the bottom of the pile after reading the title, which caused him quite the blush. He hoped he could write it off as it being "really hot in here".

"I think that one side of that machine is mine and it's supposed to connect to yours with these cords." Maka concluded.

"Um, yeah."

"What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing, nothing…it's just hot in here, that's all…"

"Whatever. Now, how are we going to get the two machines apart?" She wondered aloud. "I bet you could do it! You've fixed your motorcycle engine many times, and you said it looked like that!"

Soul's motorcycle, to put it gently, had seen better days. It was a hand-me-down from his grandpa, whom he admired. His parents told him he could ride it around the neighborhood, if he wanted to go to a friend's house or something like that, but he didn't have any friends, so he rode it wherever he wanted without their knowing. After that it had gone through many trips to and from Shibusen, been on missions, and ridden on just for fun.

The battles were the main cause of its random engine failures. Still, he was a deathscythe, not a mechanic, much less a mechanic of a soul wavelength engine. "I'll try." He said, suddenly donning a T-shirt and some old sneakers. Maka knew that neither his body nor his clothes were real, but she couldn't help but imagine him wearing his "dirty work" clothes.

Soul examined the center of the machine. He noticed the gears and things that looked recently installed. He'd have to unscrew all of those. It was very uncool of him, but he gulped; one mess up and he might stop one of their wavelengths, causing them to die. Therefore, his protective instincts told him to get rid of one of the gears on his side first. He reached for a wrench and got to work.

His assistant…wasn't very helpful. He'd order her to pass him a different tool, but she'd say something along the lines of, "which one is that?" so he gave up and told her just to stand there and hold the toolbox open for him. Maka was happier with her new job.

"THERE YOU ARE!" Make-Out Maka and Sir Soul entered the room with a crash. The real versions paused in their work in shock.

"Maka, you hold them off while I keep working." Soul ordered, hurrying with his work now that they had company.

"Right!"

Maka's first instinct was to grow some blades from her arms. She stood in front of her partner protectively.

"AHHH! Ouch!" Soul exclaimed from his work station. "Maka, your wavelength gets stronger when you turn into a weapon! I can't fix the machine if I can't freaking touch it!"

"Then what do I do?" Her blades retracted.

"I don't know! You're the smart one!"

Desperate, all she could think of was wield a Soul scythe in her hands, but after a while of fighting an almost-naked Maka with a scythe made out of a wannabe knight, she realized it wasn't working. They were evenly matched—each knew exactly what the other was going to try next. Both Makas gave up at the same time and caught their breath.

She was going to have to outwit her. She hoped that everything that she'd learned about Soul and herself in this place would help her somehow.

Sir Soul transformed back into a human to comfort Make-Out Maka. This gave Make-Out Maka an idea. "Your greatest fear is losing him? Then lose him." The girl now held a sword dripping with black liquid…was it Ragnorok? What was she going to do with that sword?

She plunged it right through his chest. Sir Soul fell to the ground.

"_That's not Soul, that's not Soul, Soul's right here behind me, fixing the machine, that's not Soul…" _Maka told herself over and over again, but couldn't get the image of Soul fall prey to the demon sword again, much less by her own hand.

Her face was still horrified at the sight of a Soul dead on the floor. "How could you?" She cried, fully aware if she gave in to Make-Out Maka's attempts to weaken her mind, it would all be over. She refrained from looking back at the real Soul.

"Because now we can fight woman to woman. Doesn't that sound fantastic?" The bloody sword stuck out of the dead daydream's stomach. "I deserved cooler, anyway. You should have created an ultra-cool Soul to pair with the beautiful me."

"You know, Make-Out Maka, I'm just as pretty as you are!" The comment got under her skin, and anger made her forget her shock of seeing Soul dead.

"No you're not. I've seen how you hate looking at yourself. You've got no tits and look like a little kid with those pigtails." She sniggered. "I bet you're too self-conscious to fight me in that modest outfit!"

Everything that came out of her mouth made her angry! Maka ripped out her pigtails.

"Look at me, I'm Maka, I cover up because all my friends are prettier than me! Oh, don't mind me, I'm just crying in my room because Soul thinks I'm ugly!" She mocked. "I'm not pretty, not _one bit!" _

"I _am _pretty." The real Maka spat. "In fact, I don't even have to be wearing stupid lingerie to know that I'm _sexy. _But it sure as hell gives me a boost of confidence!"

Catfight? Soul wondered. He paused, turning around to see a sight he never thought he'd see: two Makas in sexy outfits ripping out each other's hair. This made him very happy and he swore only one tablespoon of his blood remained in his body. "GET BACK TO WORK, PERV!" The true Maka yelled. He knew which Maka was the real one because she was winning.

He grumbled that this was _so unfair, _that he was stuck with the job of fixing the soul wavelength machines and wanted a break. Well, he wasted time with that nosebleed, so he needed to hurry to make up lost time. Only a few more and the two machines would be separate again…he tried not to get distracted by the Maka vs Maka fight.

Seriously, what the hell were they doing? It was hard not to look, but he finished his job—it was now two separate machines. He looked back to the fight, hoping to see some action, but Maka's opponent was gone.

"Oh, don't worry about her." Maka said sweetly. "She won't be coming back. So, now what?"

"We have to connect them again with these cords. Each one is a part of our relationship."

"HUH? Didn't we just work to take them apart?"

"Yeah, I think what I just did was make it so we have two distinct wavelengths again…these cords don't make it so the machines run off of each other, they're just connections…" He tried to explain. "I've been working on this damn thing for a long time. I _understand _it."

The appropriate holes were color-coded, and it was easy for him to put them all in. He shrugged his shoulders and only after remembering how Maka looked in lingerie plugged the red one in.

Each one signified an aspect of the bonds they shared with each other (or possibly might share in the future).

"OK, after I plug this last one in, we both have to get to our separate rooms as fast as we can, since we're probably going to wake up soon."

"Right." Maka nodded.

"All right, here we go…3, 2, 1!"

They ran like all hell was breaking loose.

…

They suddenly woke up. The movie that they were watching had ended, and the title menu was playing music in an endless loop. Soul turned the TV off straight away. He was very happy to be in his own body and in the real world. Maka yawned, still sleepy. Running around her soul wasn't exactly the REM sleep the mind needed to rest.

They looked at each other with a tired smile. They mutually decided to go back to bed in their respective rooms, but Maka couldn't drag herself to her room so she collapsed next to Soul in his room. She snuggled in close to his body and promptly fell asleep. He kissed her forehead fondly and tugged the covers over the both of them.

…

Side story

5 years later! What's happening with Wesley Evans?

"Brianna, dear, is it alright with you if my Granny performs a reading on Devon? It would mean a lot to the both of us." Wes asked his wife. They dated for four years before he finally got the guts to pop the question. And soon after the honeymoon…well, let's just say a test came out positive and a bouncing baby boy was in their future.

"Of course, Wes, darling. Anything for my baby." The young woman smiled, thinking about the child she was carrying. She hoped he would look like her handsome husband. Brianna wasn't exactly sure what Wes's grandmother did, only that it involved spirits and ghosts and the like. She supposed the reading might be a fortune-telling event or . . . well, she didn't mind. She was getting used to the family she married in to.

Wes and Brianna sat in the sitting room that was sort of becoming Granny's exorcism office. The pair was visiting home while Wes was on tour.

"Soul Séance." The elder woman said, feeling strangely empty without the necklace that she gave to Maka. Her readings and jobs haven't been the same since. She wondered if that's what her mentor felt when it was his time to stop exorcising. Granny looked at the small soul, now the size of a golf ball. "Devon has taken after his uncle. He is a Weapon."

"His uncle? You mean Wes's brother that I met at our wedding?" All he said to Brianna was a brief 'hello,' but she remembered his presence. After his rudeness, the boy returned to the blonde girl that came with him. Wes, knowing this would happen, told Brianna a little bit about him.

Granny nodded. "It seems like you too, Brianna, are a carrier of the Weapon Gene. Your boy will grow up to be a scythe. I am sure of it."

"Hey Granny, I have a question. Why didn't you tell Mom and Dad about Soul being a Weapon?" Wes asked. He had wanted to ask this for a while now. He also knew that Soul was a bit of a coward for not asking this.

"Put it this way: do you think they would have believed me?"

Wes's thoughts were in a war. He was torn between loyalty to his parents, believing that they knew best in all things, like all children did, and Granny's harsh reality. "You had to have told _somebody."_

"I did tell somebody. He was a colleague of mine. He advised me to let Soul figure it out on his own; to protect him as best I could but let him grow a normal, albeit talented, boy. I was a fool."

"You did right, Granny." Wes patted his grandmother's back in comfort. "Besides, now you've told us that our baby boy will be special too."

"What should we do to prepare for Devon?" Brianna asked.

"Do not tell him what he is until the gene reveals itself. Keep him away from sharp objects; some young weapons have a fascination with blades or whatever type they are. When Devon is about 11 or 12, he will partially transform against his will. That is the time you must tell him what he is and send him to Shibusen for training." Granny instructed.

The expecting parents nodded.

"No matter what anyone says, your boy is not strange, he is merely special."

A/n: Dear Shinigami! This was definitely my favorite installment of the series! I think the only one who enjoyed it more than I did was Soul. (In different ways, of course) Last time I heard from him, he was heading over to Death Secret's to buy a present for Maka . . . well, it might be more for himself, if you think about it.

By the way, since one of my favorite things to do is hide "Easter eggs"… There's a big one in the Soul Equilibrium series! Can anybody find it? I'll give you a hint: EAT. *Snickers* I think I'm a genius.

Will there be more? You'll just have to wait and see!


End file.
